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| "Education Under Fire" - Report cover |
Conflicts across the
Middle East and North Africa are preventing more than 13 million children from
attending school, leaving their hopes and futures shattered, the United Nations
Children's Fund said in a report issued on Thursday. The UNICEF report
"Education Under Fire" looked at the impact of violence on schoolchildren
in nine territories, including Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya where a generation
is growing up outside of the education system.
"It's
no coincidence in that what we see in terms of our TV pictures, the tragic
pictures of people crossing on boats to Greece and Italy, very much comes back
to the Syrian conflict and (to) the Iraqi conflict to a lesser extent,"
UNICEF regional director Peter Salama said.
Refugees
often say the education of their children is their top priority, he said, and
many countries in the region simply are not able to provide that basic human
right.
Reuters report continues:
The
study also looked at Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey - countries neighbouring Syria
and hosting large numbers of refugees, as well as Sudan and the Palestinian
Territories.
Attacks
on schools are one of the main reasons why many children cannot go to classes
while many such buildings are now being used to shelter displaced families or
are used as bases for combatants, UNICEF said.
In
Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya alone, nearly 9,000 schools are unable to be used
for education, the report said.
Thousands
of teachers across the region have abandoned their posts in fear, which has
also stopped parents from sending their children to school, it added.
Countries
hosting refugees are struggling to get children into schools because their
education systems were never created to absorb such numbers, Salama said.
"Everyone
is basically straining at the seams in terms in terms of dealing with this
massive crisis, which is not surprising given that it is the biggest population
movement since World War Two," he said.
Children
out of school can end up working illegally, often being breadwinners for their
family. They are vulnerable to exploitation and can be more easily recruited
into armed groups, he said.
UNICEF's
research shows children are increasingly becoming combatants from a younger
age, Salama said, while students and teachers have been killed, kidnapped and
arrested.
"We're on the verge of
losing an entire generation of children in the Middle East and North Africa. We
must step up, otherwise it will be irreversible and long-term damage we've
collectively inflicted upon the children of this region."
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