Overview

A non-profit child advocacy NGO, AMADE (Association Mondiale des Amis de l'Enfance or World Association of Children's Friends) was founded in 1963 by H.S.H. Princess Grace of Monaco with the mission to promote and protect children's right around the world.

Under the Presidency of H.R.H. The Princess of Hanover since April 1993, AMADE continues to be an advocate for the protection of children's rights whenever these are intellectually, morally or physically threatened and seeks:

• to raise public awareness and inform the press
  
  
• to create, promote, coordinate and support initiatives that assist the most vulnerable children
  
  
• to encourage and foster research related to the rights of the child, and disseminate the findings
  
  
• to call for legal action against individuals responsible for violating children's rights

AMADE is an internationally recognized NGO with consultative status with UNICEF, UNESCO and the United Nations Economic and Social Council, and with participative status with the Council of Europe.

Princess Grace's Legacy

A message of love

That word of love and support was handwritten by H.S.H. Princess Grace of Monaco in a message left to all those involved in the organization.

The message read: "AMADE, a word easy to remember as it sounds like the word Amour."

Programs

Headquartered in Monaco, AMADE counts more than 20 branches across the globe operating humanitarian aid programs, mostly concerned, in developing countries, with poverty, malnutrition and the need for education.

In addition to short-term programs, AMADE also develops long-term projects such as:

• Schools opened to the wind: outdoor schools for street children in South-East Asia.
• A new smile on life: support of the work of Belgian surgeon Dr. Dupuis to operate on the cleft palates of children and train local surgeons in Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar.
• Tears without eyes: continuation of a UNICEF-initiated program in Africa to supply vitamin A to young children to prevent blindness caused by vitamin-deficiency.
• The Children's children: Shelters for juvenile mothers and their babies in the Philippines and legal assistance to minors in the Children Legal Rights Office

At the international level, AMADE campaigns to fight the commercial sexual exploitation of children on the internet and bring legal action against the perpetrators of those acts. The association also started a campaign to the U.N. for the qualification of the most serious crimes against children as crimes against humanity.

October 2004 - H.R.H. The Princess of Hanover's visit to the Philippines

On Her first humanitarian field trip as President of AMADE, The Princess of Hanover visited the Philippines in October 2004 on the occasion of the 5th anniversary of AMADE Philippines.

Accompanied by Secretary General Francis Kasasa, She visited the AMADE foster home for juvenile single mothers and their babies in Manila, assessed the program for legal assistance to children in prison and met the children and families victims of toxic contamination in Subic Bay and Clark Field. AMADE has supported the local aid program Alliance Bases Clean Up (ABC) for these young victims and provided financial support for urgent medical treatment as well as for health and rehabilitation programs in these two areas.

The Princess also visited the "child prisons" where so many youngsters, both boys and girls –who, for the most part, were arrested for minor offences – are crammed together in terrible conditions. Deeply moved, She listened to their stories, an overwhelming series of testimonies so difficult to accept when one knows that 9 is the legal age at which a child can be imprisoned in the Philippines.

January/February 2007 - Visit to the Heart of Africa

From January 30 to February 13, 2007, Her Royal Highness The Princess of Hanover went on a humanitarian journey to the children of the African continent.
The President of AMADE Mondiale took this occasion to observe in person the actions of Her child-advocacy association in Niger, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa.

Having visited the Filipino children in October 2004 and being presented with the UNICEF Children's Champion Award in May 2006, The President of AMADE Mondiale just completed a tour to the Heart of the African continent, a trip that H.R.H. The Princess of Hanover used as opportunity to witness the achievements of Her organization and of the Principality of Monaco in these countries, as well as to study the needs of the African children.

On this occasion Her Royal Highness was accompanied by Her Son, Mr. Pierre Casiraghi; the Secretary General of AMADE Mondiale, Mr. Francis Kasasa; Mrs. Khadja Nin Ickx, an international artist; Mrs. Veronique Simian, private secretary of H.R.H. The Princess of Hanover, and Mrs. Marie Laure de Decker, photographer.

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More than 40 years after its creation, the mission of AMADE remains crucial...

"AMADE remains strongly committed to promoting the inalienable rights of the child as we believe there can be no other path to building a harmonious and prosperous society."