Syrian civil war is the worst humanitarian tragedy of our time. The world has been watching helplessly as hundreds of thousands of civilians are killed, millions displaced and an entire country destroyed beyond recognition. But every day this humanitarian tragedy has been spiralling, acquiring new proportions we couldn’t think of. But what has remained unchanged is the international community’s sense of helplessness, its wanton disregard and detachment at this tragedy of Himalayan proportions.
The EU police agency Europol said yesterday that over 10,000 unaccompanied migrant children have disappeared in Europe, giving rise to fears that they could have fallen into the hands of sex trafficking rings or trapped into the slave trade. The agency’s chief of staff Brian Donald says: “Not all of them will be criminally exploited; some might have been passed on to family members. We just don’t know where they are, what they’re doing or whom they are with.” What is extremely worrying is that there was evidence of a ‘criminal infrastructure’ established over the last 18 months to exploit the migrant flow. These children face a destiny that is worse than that of the rest of migrants waiting to be relocated. It’s unlikely that there will be coordinated efforts to trace these children and ensure their safety, reducing them to another statistic in a civil war in which human lives are being reduced to numbers.
European countries which are shutting their doors on asylum seekers need to adopt a more lenient policy on children. Britain is one country that has said it will take in migrant or refugee children who have been separated from their parents. Other countries must follow this policy. The picture of Aylan Kurdi lying with his face down on the beach had shocked the conscience of the world, creating a wave of sympathy for Syrian refugees and even causing a positive tilt in the refugee policies of some European countries. That the uncertainty about the fate of around 10,000 children is failing to create a similar sympathy speaks of the depths to which the Syrian crisis has sunk. A UN report said the Syrian town of Mouadamiya is newly under siege by Syrian government forces, saying around 45,000 people are cut off from humanitarian aid and medical help. Mouadamiya, on the southwestern edge of Damascus, has been
under the control of opposition armed groups since mid-2012.
Even amidst all these tragedies, negotiations being held in Geneva to find a find a solution to the Syrian crisis or reach a ceasefire are going nowhere. Representatives of the Higher Negotiation Committee (HNC) warned that they may yet walk away from the talks unless the suffering of civilians in the five-year conflict is eased.
Syrian civil war is the worst humanitarian tragedy of our time. The world has been watching helplessly as hundreds of thousands of civilians are killed, millions displaced and an entire country destroyed beyond recognition. But every day this humanitarian tragedy has been spiralling, acquiring new proportions we couldn’t think of. But what has remained unchanged is the international community’s sense of helplessness, its wanton disregard and detachment at this tragedy of Himalayan proportions.
The EU police agency Europol said yesterday that over 10,000 unaccompanied migrant children have disappeared in Europe, giving rise to fears that they could have fallen into the hands of sex trafficking rings or trapped into the slave trade. The agency’s chief of staff Brian Donald says: “Not all of them will be criminally exploited; some might have been passed on to family members. We just don’t know where they are, what they’re doing or whom they are with.” What is extremely worrying is that there was evidence of a ‘criminal infrastructure’ established over the last 18 months to exploit the migrant flow. These children face a destiny that is worse than that of the rest of migrants waiting to be relocated. It’s unlikely that there will be coordinated efforts to trace these children and ensure their safety, reducing them to another statistic in a civil war in which human lives are being reduced to numbers.
European countries which are shutting their doors on asylum seekers need to adopt a more lenient policy on children. Britain is one country that has said it will take in migrant or refugee children who have been separated from their parents. Other countries must follow this policy. The picture of Aylan Kurdi lying with his face down on the beach had shocked the conscience of the world, creating a wave of sympathy for Syrian refugees and even causing a positive tilt in the refugee policies of some European countries. That the uncertainty about the fate of around 10,000 children is failing to create a similar sympathy speaks of the depths to which the Syrian crisis has sunk. A UN report said the Syrian town of Mouadamiya is newly under siege by Syrian government forces, saying around 45,000 people are cut off from humanitarian aid and medical help. Mouadamiya, on the southwestern edge of Damascus, has been
under the control of opposition armed groups since mid-2012.
Even amidst all these tragedies, negotiations being held in Geneva to find a find a solution to the Syrian crisis or reach a ceasefire are going nowhere. Representatives of the Higher Negotiation Committee (HNC) warned that they may yet walk away from the talks unless the suffering of civilians in the five-year conflict is eased.
