War in Ukraine puts 7.5 million children at risk, says Unicef

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warns of the threat to the lives and well-being of 7.5 million Ukrainian children and adolescents. According to the institution, at least 500,000 boys and girls have already left Ukraine and become refugees after the Russian invasion. In addition to forced displacement, the child and youth population is at risk of interruption of studies, psychological trauma and bombings, according to experts told CNN.

The spokesman for the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in Brazil, Luiz Fernando Godinho, points out that another problem faced is the separation of children and adolescents from their families. “In the case of Ukraine, adult men aged 18 to 60 are not allowed to leave the country, so they go through this family separation and end up having additional trauma. We’ve seen a lot of scenes of parents saying goodbye, that’s a terrible trauma. We also had reports of families giving up on leaving Ukraine because the father cannot accompany the family,” he says.

Godinho also explains that the greater availability of weapons in the country leaves children vulnerable to cases of forced recruitment by armed groups, legal or illegal. According to UNICEF, between 2011 and 2020, more than 5,700 children were recruited to fight in the war in Syria, for example, some as young as seven years old.

According to Godinho, this Wednesday (9), an assessment by UNHCR on the child and youth population at risk within Ukraine found the possibility of exposure to bombings, landmines, lack of freedom of movement and family separation.

“The centers for displaced people are experiencing overcrowding, so there is no separation by family or gender. And this risk of gender and sexual violence intensifies in children and adolescents. The situation inside Ukraine is further complicated by the ongoing military action,” he points out.

The Specialist CNN in education, Claudia Costin, explains that the impacts on children’s development go beyond damage to learning and include adaptation to a different country. “There is another problem which is the language. Because if they leave in a situation of refuge, they enter a school where the children speak another language. Of course, the child ends up learning, even easier than adults, but it is another element of tension and of probable bullying or school suffering for this child who will have to adapt”, evaluates the specialist.

In Afghanistan, another country impacted by conflict in recent years, according to UNICEF, an estimated 4.2 million children are out of school, including more than 2.2 million girls. From January to August of last year, the UN had documented more than 2,000 serious violations of children’s rights in the country.

Claudia Costin also highlighted a consequence of the family separation for children that occurred during the war in Angola, which ended in 2002. According to the expert, after the conflict, many orphans ended up living on the streets, due to abandonment and lack of assistance.

UNICEF condemned a series of six serious violations against children and adolescents in times of war. They are: violence against children and adolescents; recruitment or use of children and adolescents in the armed forces and armed groups; attacks on schools or hospitals; sexual violence; abduction of children and adolescents; and denial of humanitarian access to children and adolescents.

On Wednesday, the city council of Mariupol, in southern Ukraine, posted a video of a devastated maternity hospital in the city and accused Russian forces of dropping several bombs in air strikes. “The destruction is enormous. The medical center building where the children were recently treated is completely destroyed. Information on victims is being clarified,” the council said.

So far, according to Ukraine’s top security official, Oleksiy Danilov, 67 children have died in the country since the Russian invasion began.