They account for half of the 2.2 million registered Syrian refugees in the region: a whole generation of Syrian children traumatized, isolated and private education, warns UN on Friday in a report.
“If we do not act quickly, a generation of innocent people will be sacrificed because of this terrible war,” warned the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, in presenting the first comprehensive study conducted by UNHCR about Syrian children since the conflict began in March 2011.
“The world must act to save the Syrian catastrophe a generation of traumatized children, isolated and beset by suffering,” for its part, warned the envoy of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Angelina Jolie.
According to the report, approximately 294,300 Syrian children found refuge in Turkey, 385,000 in Lebanon, 291,200 in Jordan, 77,120 in Iraq, 56,150 in Egypt and more than 7,600 in North Africa.
More than 3,700 of them are unaccompanied or separated from their parents. In addition, more than 70,000 Syrian refugee families live without the father.
The authors of the study, who were unable to interview children in Jordan and Lebanon, say they have received information about young boys trained to fight for a return to Syria.
In addition, they found that many refugee families without financial resources to send their children to work to ensure their survival. Jordan and Lebanon, the researchers found that children, some as young as seven working long hours for low wages, often in dangerous conditions.
Thus, in the Jordanian camp Zaatari, most businesses employ 680 children. And a study conducted in eleven of the twelve governorates of Jordan shows that nearly one in two refugee household survives in part or completely through the wage of a child.
As a result, a majority of Syrian refugees children not going to school. More than half of Syrian children of school age living in Jordan do not go to class. In Lebanon, some 200,000 Syrian refugees children old enough to go to school could remain out of school by the end of 2013.
Another symptom concern, the number of babies born in exile without a birth certificate – yet an essential document to prevent statelessness.
After nearly 1,000 days of a conflict that has claimed more than 120,000 dead, UNHCR called on the international community to support the neighboring countries of Syria to keep their borders open and improve their hosting services.
Guterres also asked other countries to offer more resettlement places and admission on humanitarian grounds for refugee families with seriously injured children and those who are insecure.
Syria: UN Calls for Saving Generation "Sacrificed" Refugee Children
