*STRICTLY EMBARGOED 00.01 WEDNESDAY 14 SEPTEMBER*
Press release
63 million children set to be displaced by conflict and insecurity by 2025[[1]]
Global Action Plan needed to respond to chronic underfunding, and prepare for potential 35 million more displaced children in the next ten years
As world leaders are due to meet in New York for two crucial Summits on refugees and migrants, War Child UK, the charity for children affected by conflict, warns that on current trends more than 63 million children could be displaced by 2025, a number roughly equivalent to the entire population of the UK. This represents a potential increase of 35 million children on today’s figures[[2]], where shockingly already one in every 200 children wakes as a refugee everyday.[[3]]
Basic rights which apply to all children - such as being with family members, having access to education and being free from fear and persecution - are being systematically denied to the world’s most vulnerable children. The charity argues aGlobal Action Plan is needed for these children’s rights to be realized - that just because they’ve moved, doesn’t mean their rights have changed – they are entitled to the same rights no matter where they are.
War Child warns that in the next ten years on current trends at least 300,000 child refugees will end up separated from their families[[4]], and without drastic changes to funding for education, 12.5 million child refugees will be out of school[[5]]. Child labour and early marriage are already increasingly common in refugee and displaced people’s communities and will likely become more acute as displacement numbers rise e.g. Early marriage has tripled among Syrian refugees in Jordan since 2011[[7]] and in Syria and neighbouring countries, children are often the main – or even the sole – earners. In Jordan, 47% of refugee households say they rely partly or entirely on income generated by a child.[[8]]
War Child is calling on world leaders to urgently develop a Global Action Plan for children forced to flee, to deal with the rising number of displaced children and make sure the same rights apply to them wherever they are, and to deal with the chronic underfunding for displaced children.
Children are being left out of the systems there to protect them as presently less than 5% of humanitarian funding is being spent on their education and protection. This is despite under 18s making up more than half of the 65 million people currently displaced.
There is also severe under-funding of UN appeals for humanitarian response in countries where the largest numbers of children are fleeing conflict – including Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia, where appeals are under-funded by an average of 60%[1]. Education was the least-funded sector in almost a third of these countries in 2015, with 73% and 85% of funding needs unmet in Iraq and DRC respectively in 2015. Protection (including child protection), was funded at less than 20% of requests and was among the most severely underfunded in half of all cases in 2015.The results are catastrophic, if not deadly, for children.
Without a significant step-change in the level of commitment and funds directed towards children forced to flee, the international community risks jeopardizing the future of millions of children the world over.
I’ve moved my rights haven’t – a report released today presents the current situations for children forced to flee and outlines the necessary steps to respond to the unfolding crisis. Solutions are recommended to ensure the millions of children who are otherwise set to become a lost generation have their futures safeguarded and their rights upheld.
World leaders must urgently develop a global action plan for children forced to flee, which would redouble political and financial commitment in the following areas:
- No child forced to flee is out of school for more than one month - by mobilising $4bn for education in emergencies by 2020
- Child Protection funding requests in UN appeals are fully funded - with no child protection efforts failing for lack of finance.
- No child forced to flee is criminalised - by committing to eliminate child detention of displaced minors.
- There are guaranteed safe and legal routes for children forced to flee, with countries resettling a fair share of displaced children – particularly unaccompanied minors.
At this critical juncture as world leaders gather in New York for two major summits – the UN High Level Meeting on Refugees and Migrants on 19th September and Barack Obama’s Leaders’ Summit on Refugees on 20th September, War Child, with their Global Ambassador Carey Mulligan, is calling on the international community to take these specific actions to ensure that children forced to flee are made an urgent humanitarian priority.
Rob Williams OBE, CEO of War Child UK, says:
Whether in a country affected by conflict or on our doorstep at the terrible camps in Calais, every child has the same basic rights.. War Child believes the rights of displaced children are being brutally and systematically ignored, and that this is unacceptable. Our ambition is that children’s rights become “immoveable” – that every child forced to flee conflict has their dignity preserved and upheld at every step of their journey. We urgently need global leaders to commit to a Global Action Plan to achieve this.
Carey Mulligan, Global Ambassador War Child says:
I’ve just returned from Jordan where I met children who have fled the Syrian conflict. Like children the world over who are forced to flee, they told me about how their lives have changed since they left Syria. Even though they should have the same rights wherever they are, they told me how their education had been severely compromised, how they feared early marriage. They told me about children who were being forced into work rather than go to school, and about family members they had lost or from whom they had been separated.These children and young people are the future – it is our collective responsibility to do the right thing by them.
A full copy of the reportI’ve Moved, My Rights Haven’t is available here War Child Report - I've moved my rights haven't [draft preview]
Ends
Notes to editors
Available Spokespeople:
- Rob Williams, CEO War Child UK
- Hannah Stoddart, Director of Advocacy and Communications, War Child UK
- Dan Collison, Director of Programmes, War Child UK
For images, or interview opportunities please contact Miranda Pitt on +44 7764989343 or Alastair Beach on +44 207 916 9276 or +44 7407 487 897
ABOUT WAR CHILD UK
War Child is striving for a world where children’s lives are no longer torn apart by war.
We are the only specialist charity for children in conflict, delivering high-impact programmes that are rebuilding lives across Afghanistan, Iraq, Jordan, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Central African Republic. We understand children’s needs, respect their rights, and put them at the centre of the solution - from supporting Syrian children to access education, to reintegrating child soldiers in the Central African Republic and enabling girls to escape life on the streets in the DRC.
We aim to reach children early in the conflict cycle and stay to support them through their recovery, providing education and protection services and also building longer-term livelihood opportunities. We support children to deal with the traumas of armed conflict, equipping them with the skills and knowledge to go back to school, and providing training to young people so they can support themselves.
We believe that children and young people know what matters to them and that their voices and demands should be heard – we work with them to build their confidence as advocates and to mobilise others to take action in support of them.
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Charity number: 1071659
[[1]]See UNICEF (September 2016), ‘Uprooted: The Growing Crisis for Refugee and Migrant Children’ P 18. In 2015 there were 28 forcibly displaced children – 17 million IDPs and 11 million refugees. Figure 1.2 shows that overall numbers of IDPs and refugees (including but not limited to children) increased from 28 – 41 million and 16 - 25 million respectively between 2010 – 2015, representing a 46.4% increase in IDPs, and a 56.25% increase in refugees. Applying these percentage increases to the 17 million child IDPs and the 11 million child refugees at five year intervals to 2025, results in 36, 436, 032 IDP children by 2025, and 26,855,468 refugee children by 2025, amounting to a total of 63,291,500 forcibly displaced children by 2025.
[[2]] 28 million children are currently displaced as a result of conflict and insecurity according to Unicef
[[3]]UNICEF, op cit
[[4]]In 2015, 98,400 asylum applications were lodged by unaccompanied or separated children across 78 countries. This number represents 1.23% of the 8 million child refugees under UNHCR’s mandate. Between 2010 and 2015 the number of refugees under UNHCR’s mandate increased by 77% (see Unicef, op cit, P 18), which projected forwards at five year intervals would result in 25,063,200 child refugees by 2025, 1.23% of which is 308,277
[[5]]Taking the projected figures for the number of refugees by 2025,(25 million) and assuming the same proportion of 50% will be out of school as is the case today. For estimates of the proportion of out of school children see Save the Children (2016) and UNESCO (2016)
[[7]]Care International UK (2015),‘To Protect Her Honour: Child Marriage in Emergencies – The Fatal Confusion Between Protecting Girls and Sexual Violence’, available at: . P. 7.
[[8]]UN Women Inter-Agency Assessment, ‘Gender-Based Violence and Child Protection Among Syrian Refugees in Jordan, With a Focus on Early Marriage’, 2013, p. 35
[1] See Figure 1