Heartbreaking photos highlight the devastating toll the world’s conflicts have taken on innocent children in 2017.
UNICEF has warned today that young people have come under attack at a shocking scale throughout the past 12 months, with parties to conflicts blatantly disregarding international laws designed to protect the most vulnerable.
Children not even old enough to walk have become frontline targets, used as human shields, killed, maimed and recruited to fight, the humanitarian organisation said.
Rape, forced marriage, abduction and enslavement have become standard tactics in conflicts from Iraq, Syria and Yemen, to Nigeria, South Sudan and Myanmar.
In some contexts, children abducted by extremist groups experience abuse yet again upon release when they are detained by security forces.
Millions more children are paying an indirect price for these conflicts, suffering from malnutrition, disease and trauma as basic services – including access to food, water, sanitation and health – are denied, damaged or destroyed in the fighting.
Manuel Fontaine, UNICEF Director of Emergency Programmes, said: ‘Children are being targeted and exposed to attacks and brutal violence in their homes, schools and playgrounds. As these attacks continue year after year, we cannot become numb. Such brutality cannot be the new normal.’
Releasing photos of their work over the last 12 months, UNICEF called on all parties to conflict to abide by their obligations under international law to immediately end violations against children and the targeting of civilian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals.