For the World Day against Child labor on June 12th
Osnabrück, June 9th, 2023 - On the occasion of the international world day, the children's rights organization terre des hommes attracts attention to the dramatic situation of children in Afghanistan. The people of Afghanistan suffer one of the greatest humanitarian disaster from the present, 97 percent of people are poor and have to make do with less than $ 2.15 a day, nine out of ten families no longer have enough to eat. »The crisis is a crisis of children: 28 million people, two thirds of the population, are dependent on humanitarian aid. Half of them - 15 million - are children, «said Joshua Hofert, board spokesman for terre des hommes .
One consequence of need is the dramatic increase in child labor. terre des hommes was able to speak to working children in the provinces Herat, Nangarhar and Kabul. They report that they have to work because the family no longer has any income, all personal belongings are sold and there is hardly anything left to eat. At the same time, children no longer find help: Protection programs have ended by the Taliban's de facto government, girls banned the school attendance after sixth grade.
Since the de facto government does not provide numbers and there is no freedom of the press, the number of working children can only be estimated. Numbers are known from three provinces, a third of them work more children than last year. The United Nations estimate that 1.6 million children work under dangerous conditions.
Children obviously work in bricks, carpet manufacturers, car workshops and forging, in small shops and in markets where they transport or sell loads. On the streets of Kabul and Herats, children begged for a piece of bread and rummage in waste piles for edible. According to the United Nations alone, 134 children were injured or killed by duds and old weapons in the first three months of this year alone, which they wanted to collect and sell as waste metal. In the country, children work in the fields and guard the cattle.
Unarvisable remain in the worst forms of child labor: children worked in mining, salt extraction and on poppy fields, they are forced to smuggle drugs or weapons. Boys are recruited for armed groups, girls and boys are sold to sexual exploitation. Because millions of families had to borrow money to survive, the number of children who work through these debts increases. The guilt bonding is particularly common in bricks, households and carpet manufacturers.
Taliban's policy makes severe violations of human rights to the government program, fueling the need and difficulting help. The oppression of women and their work bans in international aid organizations are particularly serious. This lost 10,000 women and millions of women and children the services of midwives, doctors, social workers and teachers.
"In view of this dramatic situation, we ask the federal government and the international community to provide the urgently needed humanitarian aid and to protect children from hunger and exploitation," said Joshua Hofert. »The UN's need for emergency aid for 2023 is given at $ 4.62 billion, but so far the international community has only promised $ 259 million. In addition, the world nutrition program has already announced that it will reduce auxiliary deliveries, since $ 900 million is missing for the supply from May to October 2023. Afghanistan thus runs for a famine with millions of victims. "
After stopping development aid and working bans for women, the Federal Government has now announced help "government and population", but provides significantly fewer funds: While Germany earned a help of 527 million euros in 2022, of which 330 million euros for humanitarian aid alone, the Federal Foreign Office has so far only approved 39 million euros for humanitarian aid this year.
terre des hommes Germany supports projects for 20,000 children and 41,000 adults in eleven Afghan provinces and cross -border to Pakistan with a budget of 5.2 million euros. Educational and vocational training programs, income-creating measures, psychosocial care and peace work are financed.
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"Children's work report 2023: Exploitation of children in Afghanistan"