The Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection, Agnes Naa Momo Lartey, has disclosed that government operations aimed at removing foreign children from the streets have been put on hold due to financial constraints.

Addressing Parliament on Wednesday, June 24, the Minister said that although the exercise has been temporarily suspended, previous interventions have yielded positive results and helped prevent an increase in the number of children living and working on the streets.

"To a large extent, I would say that the measures are working, because without these interventions, you realise that our streets will be flooded, and the dangers that will pose to even the children themselves is something that governments will not be able to bear," she told the House.

According to the Minister, while the government has not yet achieved its ultimate objective of eliminating the problem, the interventions undertaken so far have made a significant impact.

"You might say that we are not there yet, we don't have the perfect situation we desire yet, but I can tell you on authority that the measures are working," she stated.

Mrs Lartey, however, acknowledged that inadequate funding has affected the frequency and sustainability of the operations.

"Sometimes you have resource constraints in doing it as often as you would want to do, to sustain the efforts, but to a large extent, the efforts are indeed working," she said.

The Minister's remarks come amid ongoing concerns over the presence of foreign children, many of whom are engaged in street begging and other forms of child exploitation in major cities across the country.