Bosses at the United Nations say Archie Battersbee's life support must continue while they consider a latest legal bid from his family.

The 12-year-old boy was found unconscious at home in Southend, on 7 April. His parents who are refusing to stop fighting have made an application to the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities (UNRPD).

Archie's parents, Hollie Dance and Paul Battersbee, wanted the UNRPD to consider Archie's case, and argued it had a protocol that allowed individuals and families to "make complaints about violations of disabled people's rights".

As reported by the BBC in a letter, the chief of the UN's Human Rights Treaties Branch, Ibrahim Salama, said it had "requested the state party (the government) to refrain from withdrawing life-preserving medical treatment, including mechanical ventilation and artificial nutrition and hydration, from the alleged victim while the case is under consideration by the committee".

The BBC reports he said: "This request does not imply that any decision has been reached on the substance of the matter under consideration,"

A spokesman for the Christian Legal Centre, which supports the family, said Archie's parents contacted the UNRPD in a "last-ditch" application after the UK's Supreme Court refused to intervene.

The Supreme Court rejected an application to appeal a ruling by the Court of Appeal that it was lawful for treatment to end.

Doctors treating Archie at the Royal London Hospital, run by Barts NHS Health Trust, said he was brain-stem dead and continued life-support treatment was not in his best interests.