MaxShimba
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- Apr 11, 2008
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BEIRUT (AP) - Mohammed works at a Beirut supermarket where he waits on customers and carries their groceries home for a small tip that the 14-year-old saves to send later to his family in a village in northeastern Syria.
He is among hundreds of thousands of Syrian children who have dropped out of school and fled two years of conflict that have claimed the lives of more than 70,000 people.
He is also one of countless young Syrians now frequently seen wandering the streets of Beirut, pumping gas at stations and sometimes begging for money.
Aid groups warn that some 2 million children in Syria are facing, among other things, malnutrition, disease, early marriage and severe trauma as a result of the civil war.
To mark the second anniversary of the uprising against President Bashar Assad, the Britain-based charity Save the Children released a report Wednesday entitled "Childhood Under Fire." It says the conflict has left many children traumatized, unable to go to school and struggling to find enough to eat.
"I have to say I have been shocked and horrified by the stories that I've heard from the children here in Lebanon who fled from Syria," Justin Forsyth, chief executive of Save the Children, told The Associated Press at the group's offices in Beirut.
"You never want to hear a child talk about watching their friend killed or their father tortured in front of them or their brother shot through the leg," added Forsyth, who spent several days in Lebanon last week meeting children among the estimated 320,000 Syrian refugees who have fled to the neighboring country.
Syria's war affects generation of children - Yahoo! News
He is among hundreds of thousands of Syrian children who have dropped out of school and fled two years of conflict that have claimed the lives of more than 70,000 people.
He is also one of countless young Syrians now frequently seen wandering the streets of Beirut, pumping gas at stations and sometimes begging for money.
Aid groups warn that some 2 million children in Syria are facing, among other things, malnutrition, disease, early marriage and severe trauma as a result of the civil war.
To mark the second anniversary of the uprising against President Bashar Assad, the Britain-based charity Save the Children released a report Wednesday entitled "Childhood Under Fire." It says the conflict has left many children traumatized, unable to go to school and struggling to find enough to eat.
"I have to say I have been shocked and horrified by the stories that I've heard from the children here in Lebanon who fled from Syria," Justin Forsyth, chief executive of Save the Children, told The Associated Press at the group's offices in Beirut.
"You never want to hear a child talk about watching their friend killed or their father tortured in front of them or their brother shot through the leg," added Forsyth, who spent several days in Lebanon last week meeting children among the estimated 320,000 Syrian refugees who have fled to the neighboring country.
Syria's war affects generation of children - Yahoo! News
