Unicef Calls 2014 One of Worst Years for Children

The year 2014 has been one of the worst on record for the world’s children, the United Nations said on Monday in a report that chronicled a litany of war, violence, atrocities and disease, mostly in the Middle East and Africa.

Up to 15 million children are directly entangled in violent conflicts in the Central African Republic, Iraq, the Palestinian territories, South Sudan, Syria and Ukraine, said the report by the United Nations Children’s Fund, orUnicef.

Globally, the report said, an estimated 230 million children live in countries and areas torn by armed conflicts.

“Children have been killed while studying in the classroom and while sleeping in their beds,” said Anthony Lake, the executive director of Unicef. “They have been orphaned, kidnapped, tortured, recruited, raped and even sold as slaves.”

The report was basically a summation of the well-documented afflictions that affected children in 2014. But taken in their entirety, they presented what Unicef called a devastating picture.

“Never in recent memory have so many children been subjected to such unspeakable brutality,” Mr. Lake said.

The sheer number of crises in 2014, the report said, meant that many had garnered little lasting attention or had been completely overlooked.

“Protracted crises in countries like Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen,” it said, “continued to claim even more young lives and futures.”  Read More at NYTimes