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Ammon News - By Khetam Malkawi/ Jordan Times

AMMAN — With Syria’s war well into its third year, the number of Syrian children forced to flee their homeland as refugees has now reached one million, the UNHCR and UNICEF said in a joint statement issued this weekend.

UNICEF Representative in Jordan Dominique Hyde said 56 per cent of those children are in Jordan.

“This is not just a number… we are talking about real lives, children who witnessed conflict, ripped from home and deprived of their rights to go to school,” Hyde stressed.

“Those who have the ability to stop this conflict must find a political solution, before more children suffer,” she told The Jordan Times on Saturday.

“I truly believe that those who failed to protect children will be held accountable,” Hyde added.

Expressing appreciation for the Jordanian government’s assistance to Syrian refugees, she also noted that there are many challenges facing their children, with some having to work to help their families survive.

Some children, Hyde explained, go to work because their parents cannot work because they do not have the required permit.

She cited an example of a family of six children whom she met in Irbid, where the father has no work permit, and is not registered with the UNHCR.

This family, she said, has to pay JD150 for rent and their 15-year-old son works at a sweets shop.

“They don’t want their son working, but they have no choice, and this is the reality for so many Syrians in Jordan... this is a real challenge,” Hyde added.

However, UNICEF’s biggest concern is sending Syrian children back to school, according to Hyde.

Noting that some 180,000 children should have been in school in June, she said that when school was still running “we had 40,000 and we hope to have more than this number this year”.

UNICEF now needs $5 million to ensure that Syrian children will be able to go back to school this year, according to Hyde.

The agency has received some donations from the EU and the German government, but the funds will not cover the cost, so UNICEF is investing in informal education.

Immunisation of children is another concern for UNICEF, which will launch a “massive” vaccination campaign on September 25, targeting Jordanian and Syrian children, in addition to children of other nationalities residing in the Kingdom.

As part of the campaign, 3.9 million people under the age of 20 years will be vaccinated against measles. Children will also be immunised against polio.

Meanwhile, the joint statement indicated that children make up half of all refugees from the Syrian conflict. Most have arrived in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt; increasingly, Syrians are fleeing to North Africa and Europe.

According to the latest figures, some 740,000 Syrian child refugees are under the age of 11.

Inside Syria, some 7,000 children have been killed during the conflict, according to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, while UNHCR and UNICEF estimate that more than 2 million children have been internally displaced within Syria.

The physical upheaval, fear, stress and trauma experienced by so many children account for just part of the human crisis, the statement said.

Both agencies also highlighted the threats to refugee children from child labour, early marriage and potential sexual exploitation and trafficking.

More than 3,500 children in Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq have crossed Syria’s borders either unaccompanied or separated from their families, according to the agencies.