According to UNICEF, nearly two-thirds of all Ukrainian children have been left homeless since the Russian invasion began.
They have been forced to leave everything behind: their homes, their schools and often their family members,” Manuel Fontaine, emergency programs director for the United Nations children’s agency, told the U.N. Security Council on Monday. The figure includes children who were displaced internally as they left hard-hit areas and those who have fled the country since the war began.
More than 90 percent of the 4.5 million Ukrainians who fled the country are women and children, Fontaine said.
“Hundreds of schools and educational facilities have been attacked or used for military purposes,” he said. At least 142 children have been killed in the war, according to the United Nations, which acknowledges that its figures are incomplete.
“In my 31 years as a humanitarian, I have rarely seen so much damage caused in so little time.” Fontaine, who went to Ukraine last week, said of the invasion.
The war “continues to be a nightmare for Ukraine’s children,” he said at a news conference Monday.-He added.
Children “have been hurt in the very places where they should be safest — their homes, emergency shelters, even hospitals,” he said.
Fontaine claimed the director of one hospital he visited in Zaporizhzhia told him that doctors had treated 22 children who had lost limbs as a result of the violence.
Families are putting their lives in danger as they try to flee, he added, citing the Russian strike on the Kramatorsk train station last week, which murdered civilians, including children, as they waited to be evacuated.
Children fleeing the war face an increased risk of human trafficking and exploitation, according to UNICEF. Hundreds of children have walked into neighboring nations without their parents, putting them in a very precarious position.
”It is impossible to gauge how many Ukrainian refugee women and children might have been preyed upon by traffickers” but that so far, “known cases are thankfully few.”- said in a statement on Tuesday, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
