“Just as disturbed men torture, rape and kill each other’s wives and daughters they in the 21st Century also torture, rape and kill each other’s children. These are not soldiers but slovenly cowards who must be stopped and their pursuits left undignified with a life in prison not death because they will be studied by future historians who will condemn them to a gloomy hell.” — Sonya, RSAC Syrian Security Team
UN Secretary-General António Guterres says he is outraged at the increased number of violations committed against children.
Sadly, this is nothing new. It’s just worse. Even the United States Administration has begun to use children as a weapon of political wars.
by Melissa Hemingway Feminine-Perspective.org Staff
Rohingya children, who crossed over from Myanmar into Bangladesh, stretch out their arms out to collect chocolates and milk distributed by Bangladeshi men at Taiy Khali refugee camp, Bangladesh, Sept. 21, 2017. Photo: Gov’t of Bangladesh.
The United Nations has verified more than 21,000 violations committed against children in 2017. The United Nations Secretary General says his organization has reliable reports of more than 10,000 children killed or maimed in armed conflict in 2017, a significant increase compared to previous years and documented in his annual report on children and armed conflict published Wednesday. Children are also affected by other verified violations, including the recruitment and use of children by armed forces and armed groups, sexual violence and attacks on schools and hospitals.
Read the Full Report Here.
Boys and girls have once again been overly impacted by protracted and new violent crises. Despite some progress, the level of violations remains unacceptable.
Children in Cages In the United States as the Trump government uses confiscated and captured children as political leverage in Trump’s political war for survival against impeachment. – Video-Cap The RINJ Foundation
The Secretary-General reiterated on Wednesday that the best way to address this horrific situation is to promote peaceful solutions to conflicts. He calls on all parties to exert maximum efforts in this regard.
Captured from Twitter.com
The UN Secretary General cautiously alluded to this problem, or maybe not, but perhaps this writer should elaborate. What is happening in the United States is now used as an excuse around the world among those who feel empowered by Donald Trump’s elaborate cruelty to migrant children and his use of caged children as bargaining chips. He certainly has angered a million women I know of…
Donald Trump’s extortionist ransom sought is cooperation on a wall he wants built to separate Mexico and America; plus hard-line no-mercy immigration law including Muslim travel bans and no hearings for migrants seeking asylum.
Trump has been exploiting children, like a scurrilous criminal. He levers thousands of children confiscated from migrants and caged in big-business detainment camps to extort what he wishes from opposing politicians.
Wake Up. The UN is Politely Asking For Change. So change this!
Virginia Gamba, the UN’s expert on Children and Armed Conflict, said 66 parties to conflict are listed this year – three more than in the 2016 report – with nine government forces and 57 armed groups named.
“Among the most significant violations registered in 2017 were killing and maiming, recruitment and use and attacks on schools and hospitals, all of which registered a rise in comparison to the previous year,” she told journalists at UN Headquarters.
The United Nations seeks the assistance of everyone to develop concrete measures to end and prevent grave violations against children and to provide support and relief to affected children and all other vulnerable persons
In South Sudan, (Download: Child_Protection – Unicef – South Sudan) violence against children continued unabated with 1,221 children verified recruited and used. Rape and other forms of sexual violence against children remained disturbingly high with over 900 verified cases against both boys and girls.
The number of children detained for their alleged association with armed groups remained extremely worrisome. For instance, in Iraq, at least 1,036 children were held in juvenile detention facilities on national security-related charges, mostly for their alleged association with Daesh. In Nigeria, over 1,900 children were deprived of liberty because of their or their parents’ alleged association with Boko Haram.
In his report, the Secretary-General reminded the authorities that children formerly associated with armed groups should be treated primarily as victims and detention only used as a last resort.
UNICEF/Ahmed Abdulhaleem
On 15 March 2018 in Aden City, Yemen, children are displaced from the city of Taiz because of armed conflict.
Large scale abductions of children remained another worrying trend. In Somalia, Al-Shabab abducted over 1,600 children many of whom were also victims of recruitment and abuse or sexual violence. Massive cross-border recruitment by actors such as Daesh and Boko Haram was also documented as a continuous trend requiring concerted regional efforts.
Another disturbing trend was the denial of humanitarian access used as a tactic of war. Children in Myanmar, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen were prevented from receiving life-saving support. In Syria, 400,000 persons, including children, trapped in besieged areas such as Ghutah and Rural Damascus, faced deteriorating living conditions.
The number of unaccompanied children fleeing wars and violence also underlines the importance of a coordinated international response, including with regional and sub-regional actors, to multiply child-protection efforts and address the cross-border dimension of grave violations.