Kabul: The United Nations International Children’s Fund (Unicef) has expressed concerns over children’s casualties in Afghanistan and urged all parties involved in the war to take precautions to prevent civilian and children casualties.
Children living in armed conflict today face unprecedented threats, Unicef in a statement yesterday .
These include grave violations such as the recruitment and use of children in armed conflict, sexual violence against them, killing and maiming them, and recurrent attacks on hospitals and schools.
Violations are highlighted in the latest annual report of the Secretary-General on Children and Armed Conflict, released by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict Leila Zerrougui.
“In Afghanistan, targeted attacks against schools were reported, including improvised explosive devices and suicide attacks, burned schools and the abduction and killing of education personnel. Acts of intimidation, threats against teachers and students, and the forced closure of schools were also reported. Ten cases of the use of schools for military purposes in Afghanistan are noted in the report.”
Unicef said that 10 children were killed and seven injured in an explosion in eastern Paktia province June 3, three were killed and seven injured in an airstrike by coalition security forces in eastern Kunar province on June 6, and an Afghan man was killed with his three children on June 4. Children’s casualties show an increase of 27 percent in the first quarter of 2013 and 1,304 were killed in 2012, it said. agencies
