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11/29/07
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AFGHANISTAN: Children increasingly affected by conflict
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KHOST, 27 November 2007 (IRIN) - Razmi Khan, 12, was
once the most outstanding student in his class, but is unable to go to school.
He was badly wounded by a missile as he walked to a mosque in Nader Shah Kot
District in the southeastern province of Khost on 17 November. He was taken to a
local hospital where surgeons amputated his left leg to save his life.
"I cannot walk to school with one leg," Razmi told IRIN.
The missile, which also wounded another child and four adults, was fired by
Afghan and international forces during a joint military exercise, Gul Qasim
Khan, the governor of Nader Shah Kot District, and Col Israr Khan of the Afghan
army, said.
Razmi Khan's parents said army officers and provincial officials had sympathised
with them, but there had been no compensation.
As sympathies fade, Razmi Khan is gradually realising that as a disabled person
he has to cope with many new difficulties: He cannot play football with his
friends, ride his bicycle or go to mosque.
Right to life
In Baghlan Province where on 6 November a heavy explosion and a subsequent
shootout killed 60 children and over 12 adults, many parents are grieving for
their lost sons and daughters.
"My sons had committed no sin, so why did they kill them," whined Roqia, a
bereaved mother of two schoolchildren killed in the incident.
In Helmand Province a widow is mourning her 15-year-old son who was hanged by
Taliban insurgents for having US dollars in his pocket.
"A child's first right is the right to life. This is being denied in Afghanistan
on an ever-increasing scale," the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said in a
Child Alert report in October 2007.
Children "particularly vulnerable"
Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) estimates that over
1,400 Afghan civilians have lost their lives and hundreds of others have been
wounded in armed hostilities, aerial strikes, suicide attacks and improvised
explosions in the past 11 months.
Although there is no verified data on the exact
number of non-combatant victims of the ongoing violence in Afghanistan, children
are believed to be among the main victims, said Hangama Anwari, a commissioner
on the rights of children at the AIHRC.
"Children are particularly vulnerable to the harms of war and are exposed to
greater risks than others," said Anwari based on her studies of Afghan children
in the conflict.
According to Afghanistan's Ministry of Education, over 237 schoolchildren have
been killed in different security incidents in the past three years. However,
the AIHRC says the actual number of child victims is several times higher than
that.
"We do not have the capacity, resources or access to investigate and verify all
the security incidents involving children all over the country," Anwari said.
Plight of children to be monitored
The AIHRC, supported by UNICEF, is working to set up a mechanism whereby the
plight of Afghan children in conflict-affected areas will be monitored in
accordance with
UN Security Council Resolution 1612. The
resolution is dedicated to the rights and protection of children in a war
situation and sets out the responsibilities of parties to the conflict.
The AIHRC has repeatedly accused all sides in the armed conflict of not doing
enough to protect and ensure the safety of children and other civilians during
military hostilities.
Through its monitoring initiative, which will be launched in 2008, the rights
watchdog will consistently remind all warring parties about their obligations to
protect children during conflict, Anwari said.
The above article comes to you via IRIN, a UN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies. © UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2007
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