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	Shock at the Scale of Grave Violations committed against Children by Leila Zerrougui UN Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict   Many thousands of children became victims of widespread violations – including shocking levels of killing and maiming, recruitment and use, and denial of humanitarian access – a new United Nations report has revealed.   According to the Secretary-General’s report on children and armed conflict, presented today to the Security Council, children from countries such as Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iraq, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen, suffered an unacceptable level of violations by parties to conflict – both government forces as well as non-State armed groups.   “The tragic fate of child victims of conflict cannot and must not leave us unmoved; a child killed, recruited as a soldier, injured in an attack or prevented from going school due to a conflict is already one too many,” the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, Virginia Gamba, said in a news release today.   Of the 20 country situations included in the report, at least 4,000 verified violations committed by Government forces and over 11,500 by non-State armed groups. Afghanistan recorded the highest number of verified child casualties since the UN started documenting civilian casualties in 2009, with 3,512 children killed or maimed last year – an increase of 24 per cent compared to the previous year.   The report also documents 851 verified cases (more than double the number in 2015) of children recruited and used in Syria, and 1,915 in Somalia in 2016. It also notes that in Yemen, at least 1,340 children were killed or maimed. In Syria that number stood at 1,299.   Expressing shock over the scale of violations documented in the report, UN Secretary-General António Guterres reiterated his call on parties to conflict to abide by their responsibility to protect children, in accordance with their obligation under international humanitarian and human rights law.   “The goal of the report is not only to raise awareness of the violations of the rights of children but also to promote measures that can diminish the tragic plight of children in conflict,” read a statement attributable to the spokesperson for the Secretary-General.   “The Secretary-General is encouraged that several governments and non-state actors are now working with the United Nations towards that objective. He hopes that more will follow,” it added.   The statement further noted that the new Developments and Concerns section included in the report reflects this enhanced UN engagement, which should lead to reducing the suffering of children victims of armed conflict and increase their protection.   The violations covered in the report include recruitment or use of children; killing or maiming children; committing rape and other forms of sexual violence against children; engaging in attacks on schools and/or hospitals; and abducting children in situations of armed conflict.   The parties which committed these violations are listed in annexes to the report. The annexes also include parties that have put in place measures to improve protection of children during the reporting period and those who have not implemented adequate measures. http://bit.ly/2hXHICg   http://childrenandarmedconflict.un.org/press-release/millions-of-children-caught-in-conflict-victims-and-targets-of-despicable-harm/   Annual Report of the Secretary-General on children and armed conflict   In his Annual report on children and armed conflict covering the year 2015, the UN Secretary-General expressed his shock at the scale of grave violations committed against children in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen.   Emerging and escalating crises had a horrific impact on boys and girls. The situation in Yemen was particularly worrisome with a five-fold increase in the number of children recruited and six times more children killed and maimed compared to 2014. Violations committed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) continued to have a devastating impact on children, including persistent child recruitment and use and boys featured as child soldiers in social media and in some cases as executioners.   In Nigeria, Boko Haram increased suicide attacks, including by using 21 girls as suicide bombers in crowded public spaces. The armed group spread its activities from northeastern Nigeria to neighboring countries, causing a significant number of casualties among civilians and large-scale displacements.   “In several situations of conflict, aerial operations contributed to creating complex environments in which large numbers of children were killed and maimed. State-allied armed groups and militia have also increasingly been used to fight in support of Government forces, in some cases recruiting and using children,” said Leila Zerrougui, the UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict.   In Syria, thousands of children have been killed during over five years of war. Afghanistan recorded the highest number of child deaths and injuries since the UN started systematically documenting civilian casualties in 2009.   In Somalia, there was a 50% increase in the number of recorded violations against children. In South Sudan, children were victims of gruesome violations, particularly during brutal military offensives against opposition forces.   “I am also gravely concerned by the increasing number of children deprived of liberty for their alleged association with parties to conflict. I call upon Member States to treat these children primarily as victims to ensure the full protection of their human rights and to urgently put in place alternatives to detention and prosecution of children,” declared Leila Zerrougui.   Reducing the impact of violent extremism on children   Again in 2015, children were significantly affected by violent extremism and too often the direct targets of acts intended to cause maximum civilian casualties and terrorize communities. In addition, the response to armed groups perpetrating violent extremism created new challenges for the protection of children.   In the report, the Secretary-General urged Member States to ensure their engagement in hostilities and responses to all threats to peace and security, including in efforts to counter violent extremism, are conducted in full compliance with international humanitarian, human rights and refugee law. He added that it is “unacceptable that failure to do so has resulted in numerous violations of children’s rights”.   The report recommended that Member States include specific mitigating measures for the protection of children in their responses, particularly when conducting aerial bombing campaigns or ground operations, and called on all parties to conflict to refrain from using explosive weapons with wide-area effects in populated areas, and to consider making a commitment to this effect.   Attacks on schools, hospitals and protected persons   Attacks on schools and hospitals were prevalent in 2015 and documented in 19 out of 20 situations of conflict. The increasing use of airstrikes and explosive weapons in populated areas had a detrimental impact on schools and hospitals. Medical and education personnel continued to be threatened or attacked.   In some conflict situations, armed groups particularly targeted girl’s access to education or attacked schools and teachers to impose their own curriculum.   Abduction   With the adoption of resolution 2225 a year ago, the UN Security Council requested the Secretary-General to list parties to conflict that engage in patterns of abduction of children. As a result, Boko Haram, ISIL, the Lord’s Resistance Army and Al-Shabaab are among six parties listed in the report for this violation.   Children, Not Soldiers   The momentum created by the campaign ‘Children, Not Soldiers’ helped consolidate the emerging consensus that children do not belong in security forces in conflict. In March 2016, the Government of Sudan, the last of the Campaign countries, signed an Action Plan to end and prevent the recruitment of children.   All Governments identified by the Secretary-General for the recruitment and use of children in their security forces have now engaged in an Action Plan process and there was some progress in Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Myanmar. Despite prior commitments by their Governments, children in Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen faced challenging conflict situations.   In 2015, there was greater engagement with non-State armed groups, within or outside the framework of peace processes, in the Central African Republic, Colombia, Mali, Myanmar, the Philippines, Sudan and South Sudan, which led to the release of over 8,000 children.   “The recent agreement between the Government of Colombia and the FARC-EP to release all children associated with the armed group is welcome,” said the Special Representative.   There are some 250 million children — one in nine children worldwide — who live in countries affected by violent conflicts.   http://childrenandarmedconflict.un.org/press-release/shock-at-the-scale-of-grave-violations-committed-against-children-in-2015/ http://watchlist.org/category/news/ http://www.warchild.org.uk/issues/child-protection http://www.warchild.org.uk/news/war-child-and-world-humanitarian-summit http://www.nrc.no/?did=9200387#.VybAYkd1BhF http://www.unicef.org/hac2016/ http://www.unicef.org/media/media_91119.html http://srsg.violenceagainstchildren.org/story/news-type/news-items http://goo.gl/YFf082 http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=54136#.V1Jovb51BhH http://www.unicef.org/endviolence/ Visit the related web page
	Violence and conflict sees child malnutrition at an all-time high by UNICEF, WFP, agencies   Nov. 2017   Yemen facing largest famine the world has seen for decades, warns UN aid chief. (UN News)   Yemen will be gripped by famine – one the likes of which the world has not seen in years – if the blockade on basic supplies into the country imposed by the Saudi Arabia-led coalition is not lifted immediately, the top United Nations humanitarian official has warned.   “It will be the largest famine the world has seen for many decades,” Mark Lowcock, the UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, told the media late Wednesday, after briefing the Security Council.   Three years into a brutal conflict, Yemen depends on imports – amounting to up to 90 per cent of its daily needs – and millions in the country are being kept alive by humanitarian aid.   The fighting has also all but collapsed the country''s health, and water and sanitation systems. Combined with the lack of food, millions of lives – including those of children – will be lost as their bodies will simply not have the strength to fight off disease.   “What kills people in famine is infections […] because their bodies have consumed themselves, reducing totally the ability to fight off things which a healthy person can,” added Mr. Lowcock.   Underscoring that an immediate resumption of regular UN and relief organizations air services to the capital, Sana''a, and Aden are critical to save lives, Mr. Lowcock, also the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, said that a clear and immediate assurance is also urgently needed that those services will not be disrupted.   Furthermore, all vessels that have passed inspection by the UN Verification and Inspection Mechanism should not be subjected to interference, delays to or blockages so that they can proceed to port as rapidly as possible, he added.   “This is really important because humanitarian access through the ports was inadequate even before the measures that were announced on 6 November,” said the senior UN official.   He also called for an immediate agreement to the prepositioning of the World Food Programme (WFP) – the UN''s emergency food relief agency – vessel in the waters off Aden, assurances that there will be no further disruption to the functions the vessel supports, as well as resumption of humanitarian and commercial access to all the seaports of Yemen.   Mr. Lowcock, also underscored the Organization''s condemnation of the missile attack on the Saudi capital, Riyadh, over the weekend, terming it an outrageous act. The coalition imposed the restrictions following the attack, effectively closing air, sea and land access to the war-torn country.   The humanitarian community in Yemen also warned that the current stock of vaccines in the country will only last one month and if not replenished, outbreaks of communicable diseases are to be expected with fatal consequences, particularly for children under five and those already suffering from malnutrition.   “The humanitarian situation in Yemen is extremely fragile and any disruption in the pipeline of critical supplies such as food, fuel and medicines has the potential to bring millions of people closer to starvation and death,” said humanitarian organizations, including the UN, working in Yemen in a joint statement Thursday.   “The continued closure of borders will only bring additional hardship and deprivation with deadly consequences to an entire population suffering from a conflict that it is not of their own making,” they added.   Calling for the immediate opening of all air and seaports to ensure the entry of food, fuel and medicines into the country, the humanitarian community ask the Saudi-led Coalition to facilitate unhindered access of aid workers to people in need, in compliance with international law, by ensuring the resumption of all humanitarian flights.   “We reiterate that humanitarian aid is not the solution to Yemen’s humanitarian catastrophe. Only a peace process will halt the horrendous suffering of millions of innocent civilians,” they stressed. http://bit.ly/2iIpMIB   Nov. 2017   The UN, the Red Cross and humanitarian agencies have called on the Saudi-led coalition to immediately reopen humanitarian aid channels into Yemen, after a decision was taken to seal the stricken country’s air, sea and land borders.   The UN described the closure of aid channels as “catastrophic”. Food, medicine and other essential supplies are “critical for the survival” of the country’s 27 million population, weakened by war, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) added. Yemen is in the grip of the world’s worst cholera outbreak and 7 million people are already on the brink of famine.   Humanitarian operations, including UN aid flights, are blocked because the air and sea ports, including Hodeidah, where most aid is delivered, are closed.   The UN reported it was not permitted flight clearance for two humanitarian flights bound for Yemen on Monday. A Red Cross shipment of chlorine tablets, to prevent cholera, was not allowed in at the country’s northern border, the ICRC said. Medical supplies, including insulin, are expected.   Yemen has been named the UN’s number one humanitarian crisis.   “We hear reports this morning that prices of cooking gas and petrol for cars and so on are already spiralling out of control,” Jens Laerke, from the UN office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told a news briefing. “So this is an access problem of colossal dimensions.”   Johan Mooij, Yemen director of Care International, said: “For the last two days, nothing has got in or out of the country. Fuel prices have gone up by 50% and there are queues at the gas stations. People fear no more fuel will come into Hodeidah port.”   He explained that food insecurity was helping cholera to spread. “People depend on the humanitarian aid and part of the cholera issue is that they do not eat and are not strong enough to deal with unclean water.”   Robert Mardini, ICRC’s regional director for the near and Middle East, said: “Insulin cannot wait at a shuttered border since it must be kept refrigerated. Without a quick solution to the closure, the humanitarian consequences will be dire.”   Mardini said he was also concerned at the “steadily growing” number of civilian casualties and the targeting of non-military infrastructure, such as water treatment plants and civilian airports. “Such actions are in violation of international humanitarian law,” he said.   Rupert Colville, a spokesman from the UN high commissioner for human rights, told Reuters the agency would study whether the blockade amounted to “collective punishment”, unlawful under international law, and said he hoped it would be temporary. The agency has expressed concern over a series of recent attacks on markets and homes that have killed scores of civilians, including children.   http://bit.ly/2yf4d8Q http://bit.ly/2zpaBxP http://tmsnrt.rs/2ArYq19 http://www.icrc.org/en/document/yemen-urgent-call-keep-borders-open-health-medical-supplies http://bit.ly/2hiF0qT   Dec. 2016   Nearly 2.2 million children in Yemen are acutely malnourished and require urgent care. At least 462,000 children suffer from Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM), a drastic increase of almost 200 per cent since 2014. An additional 1.7 million children suffer from Moderate Acute Malnutrition.   The situation of severely malnourished children in Governorates such as Hodeida, Sa’ada, Taizz, Hajjah and Lahej is most critical. These five governorates put together have the highest of all SAM cases in the country. Sa’ada also has the world’s highest stunting rates amongst children with an unprecedented eight out of 10 children in some areas being chronically malnourished.   “Malnutrition in Yemen is at an all-time high and increasing,” said Dr Meritxell Relano, UNICEF Acting Representative in Yemen. “The state of health of children in the Middle East’s poorest country has never been as catastrophic as it is today.”   Even before the escalation of the conflict in March 2015, Yemen faced challenges from widespread poverty, food insecurity and a dearth of health services. Now Yemen’s health system is on the verge of collapse.   Less than a third of the country’s population has access to medical care. Less than half of health facilities are functional. Health workers have not been paid their wages for months and aid agencies are struggling to bring in lifesaving supplies because of the political deadlock between the warring parties.   At least one child dies every ten minutes in Yemen because of preventable diseases such as diarrhoea, malnutrition and respiratory tract infections.   “Violence and conflict have reversed significant gains made in the last decade in the health and nutrition of Yemeni children. Diseases such as cholera and measles have spread and, with few health facilities functional, such outbreaks are taking a heavy toll on children,” said Relano.   In 2016, UNICEF has supported the treatment of 215,000 children suffering from SAM across Yemen and provided more than 4 million children under the age of five with vitamin supplements to boost their immunity. But this lifesaving work remains hindered by the shortage of funding and limited access to areas caught in the fighting.   “We call on parties to the conflict to give us unhindered access to children in need across the country so we are able to deliver nutrition supplies, treat malnourished children and support Yemen’s health services,” said Relano.   Funding continues to be a challenge. In 2017, UNICEF needs US$70 million to provide the much needed nutrition services to mothers and children across the country.   According to UNICEF, nearly one in five children across the Middle East and North Africa is in need of immediate humanitarian assistance, with violent conflict, poverty and displacement creating dire conditions that push almost 29 million boys and girls to the brink.   After years of conflict across the Middle East and North Africa, children have increasingly come under attack and suffer the brunt of war in half of the countries in the region.   An estimated 8.4 million Syrian children are in need of immediate assistance for shelter, food and water, compared to 500,000 in 2012.   Nearly half a million children are living in besieged areas in Syria and have received little to no aid in almost two years.   Almost 10 million children in Yemen are affected by conflict and living in critical conditions, with nearly 400,000 at risk of severe acute malnutrition.   Extreme brutality against children is rife in Iraq. According to reports, nearly 400 child rights violations were recorded since January 2016. The ongoing military operation in Mosul has displaced nearly 74,000 people, almost half of them children.   In Sudan, Libya and the State of Palestine, conflict has pushed millions of children out of their homes and schools and denied them access to basic services.   “These grim figures should be an urgent wake up call to the world to work harder so that each and every child across the Middle East and North Africa can survive, thrive and be reach their full potential,” said Geert Cappelaere, UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa. “This is not a lost generation. History will judge us: we must invest more in the region’s children today.”   UNICEF has helped provide formal and informal learning opportunities for Syrian refugees in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon.   In Syria and neighbouring refugee-host countries, UNICEF has helped vaccinate over 21 million children against polio in 2016, and in Sudan, over 82,000 children have received psycho-social support this year. Since January, four million children in Yemen have received nutritional services with support from UNICEF.   July 2016   Violence Destroys Childhoods in Iraq. (UN Children''s Fund)   3.6 million children in Iraq – one in five in the country - are at serious risk of death, injury, sexual violence, abduction and recruitment into armed groups, according to a new UNICEF report.   A Heavy Price for Children reveals that the number of children in danger of these violations has increased by 1.3 million in 18 months.   The findings show that 4.7 million children need humanitarian aid – a third of all Iraqi children – while many families now face deteriorating conditions following military operations in Fallujah and around Mosul.   “Children in Iraq are in the firing line and are being repeatedly and relentlessly targeted,” said Peter Hawkins, UNICEF Iraq Representative. “We appeal to all parties for restraint and to respect and protect children. We must help give children the support they need to recover from the horrors of war and contribute to a more peaceful and prosperous Iraq.”   UNICEF’s report documents the scale and complexity of the humanitarian crisis in a country reeling from nearly four decades of conflict, insecurity and neglect, and where the impact on children worsens every day.   Staggeringly, a total of 1,496 children have been abducted in the country over the past two and a half years. That translates to 50 children abducted each month, with many forced into fighting or sexually abused.   “The kidnapping of children from their homes, their schools and from the streets is horrifying”, said Hawkins. “These children are being ripped from their families and are subjected to sickening abuses and exploitation.”   The report also shows that almost ten per cent of Iraqi children – more than 1.5 million – have been forced to flee their homes because of violence since the beginning of 2014, often multiple times. Nearly one in five schools is out of use due to conflict and almost 3.5 million children of school-age are missing out on an education.   UNICEF is calling for urgent action to protect children’s rights in Iraq. There are five concrete steps that need to be taken immediately:   End the killing, maiming, abduction, torture, detention, sexual violence and recruitment of children. Stop attacks on schools, medical facilities and personnel.   Provide unhindered and unconditional humanitarian access to all children wherever they are in the country, including areas not under control of the government. In areas with ongoing conflict, civilians wishing to leave must be given safe passage and receive the services they need.   Expand and improve education for out of school children through catch up classes. Increase access to learning and equip teachers and children with educational materials and training. These are the children who will rebuild Iraq and contribute to a more peaceful and stable future.   Provide psychological and recreation programmes to help children heal and to reconnect with their childhoods.   Increase funding, as resources are running short, already leading to cut backs in life-saving support for children. UNICEF is seeking US$ 100 million for its response in Iraq for 2016.   http://www.unicef.org/appeals/yemen.html http://www.unicef.org/emergencies/syria/ http://www.unicef.org/appeals/iraq.html http://reliefweb.int/report/iraq/iraq-s-displacement-crisis-unhcr-preparing-worse-come-enar http://www.nrc.no/news/2016/july/iraq-international-community-must-prioritise-safety-of-mosul-civilians-to-avoid-catastrophe/ http://reliefweb.int/report/iraq/search-safety http://www.unocha.org/iraq Visit the related web page
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