By Jeff Mwaura – Jeff@Alleastafrica.com
Juba , S. Sudan –The fighting in south Sudan has displaced more than one million children according to the UN’s agencies for refugees (UNHCR) latest figures.
UNHCR and UNICEF have also said, of the 1.8 million refugees who arrived in neighbouring countries since fighting began, 62 percent are children.
South Sudan’s neighboring like countries like Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo have received more than 75,000 refugee children at refugee registration centres without their a families.
These children are reported to be in a state of trauma, physical upheaval, fear and stress experience of what is happening back home.
It’s reported that many children in have been forced to be become Child soldiers, by armed forces. They are also facing increasing sexual abuse and exploitation.
According to the statement, more than 1,000 children have been killed or injured since fresh conflict erupted in 2013, while an estimated 1.14 million children have been internally displaced.
“No refugee crisis today worries me more than South Sudan,” said Valentin Tapsoba, UNHCR’s Africa Bureau Director.
“Refugee children are becoming the defining face of this emergency is incredibly troubling.”
For children still living in South Sudan, the situation is grim.
Nearly three quarters of children are out of school, according to the UN statement, which is the highest out-of-school population in the world.
UNHCR is providing shelter to over half a million South Sudanese refugees in northern Uganda and is urgently preparing new settlements to shelter 30,000 new arrivals.
UNICEF is appealing to the international community to respond to South Sudan crisis and support its US$181 million budget which is currently only 52 per cent funded to address the acute needs of refugees until the end of the year .
UNHCR is also appealing for funding of US$ 781.8 million which is only 11 per cent funded.
(Editing by Nangayi Guyson)
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