- 60 - In this regard, Article 18 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child establishes that: “[…] 2. For the purpose of guaranteeing and promoting the rights set forth in the present Convention, States Parties shall render appropriate assistance to parents and legal guardians in the performance of their child -rearing responsibilities and shall ensure the development of institutions, facilities and services for the care of children . 3. States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that children of working parents have the right to benefit from child -care services and facilities for which they are eligible.” Consequently, the Committee on the Rights of the Child has indicated that “the State should provide support to the parents in assuming their parental responsibilities, and restore or enhance the family’s capacity to take care of the child, unless separation is necessary to protect the child.” Committee on the Rights of the Child, General Comment No. 14 on the right of the child to have his or her best interests taken as a primary consideration (art. 3, para. 1), UN Doc. CRC/C/GC/14, May 29, 2013, para. 61. 361 Article 9(3) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child establishes that “States Parties shall respect the right of the child who is separated from one or both parents to maintain personal relations and direct contact with both parents on a regular basis, except if it is contrary to the child's best interests .” 362 The custody requests by the children’s maternal grandmother and godmothers were rejected based on superficial social studies that were full of stereotypes. The reports concluded that the godmothers and the maternal grandmother did not constitute a resource for the protection of the children, in part, due to the alleged lack of financial resources and, in the case of the maternal grandmother, also owing to her sexual orientation. Those elements are examined in greater detail in the section of this chapter on the prohibition of discrimination infra. However, the Court notes that the deficiencies in the investigation into the children’s situation mentioned previously were also present in the investigation of the godmothers and grandmother. In particular, the failure to interview people who could have been relevant to determine the situation of the children; that the views of Osmín Tobar Ramírez were not heard regarding the possibility of living with his grandmother, or of J.R in any of the cases, and that the social study on the godmothers was drawn up by an organization that may have had an interest in the result of the declaration of abandonment proceedings. On this last point, it is worth emphasizing that the social study on the godmothers prepared by Niños de Guatemala even repeated the recommendation that “they should be declared to have been abandoned in order to be able to include them in the adoption program sponsored by Niños de Guatemala.” Social study by the social worker of Niños de Guatemala of May 4, 1997 (evidence file, folio 4317). 363