She pointed to children and young people whose lives are being shattered by conflicts, including in Yemen, Mali and South Sudan. She also cited youngsters recruited to fight, killed by a land mine or an attack on their school, and “losing hope not only in their futures, but in the futures of their countries.”

Sweden, which holds the Security Council presidency this month, organized the open meeting on the theme “Protecting Children Today Prevents Conflict Tomorrow” and sponsored a resolution unanimously adopted by the 15 members to strengthen UN actions to ensure the care and safety of youngsters.

“We are not doing nearly enough to protect our children,” Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, who presided at the meeting, said, stressing that “350 million children are affected by armed conflict today.”

The resolution states for the first time that children recruited or caught up in armed conflict should be treated primarily as victims, he said.

It urges all countries “to consider non-judicial measures as alternatives to prosecution and detention that focus on the rehabilitation and reintegration for children formerly associated with armed forces and armed groups.”

Lofven said the resolution also for the first time makes the point that the needs and vulnerabilities of girls and boys are different and stresses that access for all youngsters to education and physical and mental health care is essential.

It also sets out a framework to reintegrate children associated with armed groups or armed forces into society, which “places children as part of the solution, not part of the problem,” he said.

US Ambassador Nikki Haley told the council that “more than 60 percent of people in conflict-affected countries are under the age of 25.” In countries like Afghanistan, an entire generation has never lived in peace, she said.

She stressed the importance of education as “a way to recover from conflict and prevent it in the future,” warning that children who grow up uneducated, unskilled and resentful “will be prime targets for recruitment by extremists and armed groups.”

Virginia Gamba, the UN special representative for children and armed conflict, said she is “profoundly shocked” by the more than 21,000 violations of children’s rights in 2017 recently reported by the UN, a significant increase from 2016.

“The majority of these despicable acts were perpetrated by armed groups although government forces and unknown armed actors played an important part. Each and every one of them led to unspeakable suffering for children, families and entire communities,” she said.

Gamba said the level and severity of the latest violations demonstrate the need for united action “to change the tide of history,” including by focusing on prevention and reintegration “to break cycles of violence” against children.

The post One in 4 children live in country of conflict or disaster – UN appeared first on New Mail Nigeria.

Around the world, violent conflict is driving humanitarian needs to critical levels, with children especially vulnerable. Conflicts that have endured for years – such as those in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Iraq, Nigeria, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen, among other countries – continue to deepen in complexity, bringing new waves of violence, displacement and disruption to children’s lives.

“Children cannot wait for wars to be brought to an end, with crises threatening the immediate survival and long term future of children and young people on a catastrophic scale,” said UNICEF Director of Emergency Programmes, Manuel Fontaine.

“Children are the most vulnerable when conflict or disaster causes the collapse of essential services such as healthcare, water and sanitation. Unless the international community takes urgent action to protect and provide life-saving assistance to these children, they face an increasingly bleak future.”

Parties to conflicts are showing a blatant disregard for the lives of children. Children are not only coming under direct attack, but are also being denied basic services as schools, hospitals and civilian infrastructure are damaged or destroyed. Approximately 84 per cent ($3.015 billion) of the 2018 funding appeal is for work in countries affected by humanitarian crises borne of violence and conflict.

The world is becoming a more dangerous place for many children, with almost one in four children now living in a country affected by conflict or disaster. For too many of these children, daily life is a nightmare.

The spread of water-borne diseases is one of the greatest threats to children’s lives in crises. Attacks on water and sanitation infrastructure, siege tactics which deny children access to safe water, as well as forced displacement into areas with no water and sanitation infrastructure – all leave children and families at risk of relying on contaminated water and unsafe sanitation. Girls and women face additional threats, as they often fulfil the role of collecting water for their families in dangerous situations.

“117 million people living through emergencies lack access to safe water and in many countries affected by conflict, more children die from diseases caused by unclean water and poor sanitation than from direct violence,” said Fontaine.

“Without access to safe water and sanitation, children fall ill, and are often unable to be treated as hospitals and health centres either do not function or are overcrowded. The threat is even greater as millions of children face life-threatening levels of malnutrition, making them more susceptible to water-borne diseases like cholera, creating a vicious cycle of undernutrition and disease.”

As the leading humanitarian agency on water, sanitation and hygiene in emergencies, UNICEF provides over half of the emergency water, sanitation and hygiene services in humanitarian crises around the world.

When disasters strike, UNICEF works with partners to quickly provide access to safe drinking water, sanitation services and hygiene supplies to prevent the spread of disease. This includes establishing latrines, distributing hygiene kits, trucking thousands of litres of water to displacement camps daily, supporting hospitals and cholera treatment centres, and repairing water and sanitation systems.

These measures save lives, have long-term impact and pave the way for other important services like health clinics, vaccination programmes, nutrition support and emergency education.

The largest component of UNICEF’s appeal this year is for children and families caught up in the Syria conflict, soon to enter its eighth year. UNICEF is seeking almost $1.3 billion to support 6.9 million Syrian children inside Syria and those living as refugees in neighbouring countries.

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From Syria to Yemen and Iraq, from South Sudan to Nigeria, children are under direct attack, their homes, schools and communities in ruins, their hopes and futures hanging in the balance. In total, almost one in four of the world’s children lives in a country affected by conflict or disaster.

“In country after country, war, natural disaster and climate change are driving ever more children from their homes, exposing them to violence, disease and exploitation,” said UNICEF Director of Emergency Programmes, Manuel Fontaine.

UNICEF’s Humanitarian Action for Children sets out the agency’s 2017 appeal totaling $3.3 billion, and its goals in providing children with access to safe water, nutrition, education, health and protection in 48 countries across the globe.

An estimated 7.5 million children will face severe acute malnutrition across the majority of appeal countries, including almost half a million each in northeast Nigeria and Yemen.

“Malnutrition is a silent threat to millions of children,” said Fontaine, adding that “The damage it does can be irreversible, robbing children of their mental and physical potential. In its worst form, severe malnutrition can be deadly.”

The largest single component of the appeal is for children and families caught up in the Syria conflict, soon to enter its seventh year. UNICEF is seeking a total of $1.4 billion to support Syrian children inside Syria and those living as refugees in neighbouring countries.

In total, working alongside its partners, UNICEF’s other priorities in 2017 are:
* Providing over 19 million people with access to safe water;
* Reaching 9.2 million children with formal or non-formal basic education;
* Immunizing 8.3 million children against measles;
* Providing psychosocial support to over two million children;
* Treating 3.1 million children with severe acute malnutrition.

In the first ten months of 2016, as a result of UNICEF’s support:
* 13.6 million people had access to safe water;
* 9.4 million children were vaccinated against measles;
* 6.4 million children accessed some form of education;
* 2.2 million children were treated for severe acute malnutrition.

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