Prevalence,
Abuse & Exploitation of Street Children In the first decade of the 21st Century gvnet.com/streetchildren/Iraq.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the
situation in HOW TO USE THIS WEBPAGE Students If you are looking
for material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on
this page and others to see which aspect(s) of street life are of particular
interest to you. You might be
interested in exploring how children got there, how they survive, and how
some manage to leave the street.
Perhaps your paper could focus on how some street children abuse the
public and how they are abused by the public … and how they abuse each
other. Would you like to write about
market children? homeless children? Sexual and labor exploitation? begging? violence? addiction? hunger? neglect? etc. There is a lot to the subject of Street
Children. Scan other countries as well
as this one. Draw comparisons between
activity in adjacent countries and/or regions. Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper resources
that are available on-line. Teachers Check out some of
the Resources
for Teachers attached to this website. ***
FEATURED ARTICLE *** Grim
Time for Iraq's Street Children Charles A. Radin, The www.iraqfoundation.org/news/2003/fjun/4_children.html [accessed 31 May
2011] streetchildrennews.wordpress.com/2003/06/04/grim-time-for-iraqs-street-children/ [accessed 17
December 2016] Iraqi society
attaches a heavy stigma to street children, whether they are orphans or war
victims. These days, most orphanages are accepting only the children they
cared for before the war who scattered during the conflict. The newly
orphaned and deserted children on the streets, said to number at least a few
thousand, are objects of scorn. Children lured into
drugs and prostitution UN Integrated
Regional Information Networks IRIN, www.irinnews.org/report/70094/iraq-children-lured-into-drugs-and-prostitution [accessed 10 March
2015] GLUE SNIFFING - Sami Rubaie, 12, lives on the streets of "I cry every
time a man has sex with me and they usually hit me because I am crying. After
I do it, my boss gives me a good quantity of glue and around US $3 dollars
for food. I know what I'm doing is wrong but it's better than living with
daily beatings from my father for not bringing him enough money," Sami
said. ***
ARCHIVES *** The Department of Labor’s 2004 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/tda2004/iraq.htm [accessed 13
February 2011] INCIDENCE
AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - Recent information
indicates that in urban areas, children are employed in merchant shops, as
ticket collectors on buses, and are found washing cars, shining shoes, and
cleaning litter from streets. Children work as vendors of cigarettes, gum,
candy, food, soft drinks, pornographic videos, fruit, fuel, used clothes, and
junk. Children also dig through
rubbish, drive donkey carts and work in brick factories in Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61689.htm [accessed 9 February
2020] CHILDREN
-
MOLSA operated a total of 22 orphanages for older children in In an effort to
address juvenile delinquency, the MOI, in cooperation with MOLSA, initiated
on March 20 a campaign to respond to the growing problem of street children. MOLSA
officials estimated that approximately 480 homeless children in Concluding
Observations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) UN Convention on the
Rights of the Child, 9 October 1998 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/iraq1998.html [accessed 13
February 2011] [27] The Committee
notes with concern the situation of children living and/or working on the
streets, particularly as it relates to economic and sexual exploitation. In
this regard, the Committee encourages the State party to increase preventive
measures and its efforts to ensure the rehabilitation and reintegration of
these children. Iraqi Women Demand
Humanitarian Attention for Iraqi Children Iraqi Women's
League, June 4 2008 www.politicalaffairs.net/iraqi-women-demand-humanitarian-attention-for-iraqi-children/ [accessed 31 May
2011] The number of those
who have not attended school is close to one million because of deteriorating
security conditions in most regions of In the midst of the
despair that hangs over people's lives, and the magnitude of disaster
suffered by the society and children in particular, thousands of them have
turned into street children and become addicts of drugs that have become
widely smuggled or cultivated since the occupation of our country. The overall tragic situation of children in
Iraq makes them among the most miserable children in the world. Despite this,
they have not yet found their place on the agenda and priorities of the Iraqi
government. The Children of Jasim Dakhil,
Asharq Al-Awsat, www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=3&id=11264 [accessed 31 May
2011] Anyone passing
through the popular districts in Ahmed Salem, six
years old, tried to persuade people at Basra’s al Ashar
market to buy his nylon bags so that he can, “earn some money to provide food
for his mother and younger sister,” he said. Ahmed is one of dozens of
children who stand in traffic intersections trying to sell their wares of
tissue boxes, bananas, soft drinks, and chocolate. Halima Abdul
Hussein, 8 years old, speaks in a manner that does not belie the fact that
she is an orphan so that she would not evoke sympathy; she said that, “I live
with my three cousins and we go to the traffic intersection of al Tarbia Street from early in the morning until the evening
so we can earn our livelihood,” and confirmed that she really wanted to go to
school. Poverty Wages War
on Iraqi Children Amit Pyakurel (ammykumars), OhmyNews, 2007-03-15 english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?at_code=398032 [accessed 31 May
2011] english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?menu=c10400&no=350407&rel_no=1 [accessed 17
December 2016] The number of
street children has greatly risen in Iraq since the U.S.-led occupation began
in 2003. The foremost reason for this is the deteriorating economic condition
of the country, according to the NGO Coordination Committee in Iraq (NCCI). And, as many have died
since the start of the war, the significant increment of the number of widows
and orphans has also largely resulted in children who have to beg and try to
sustain their lives on the streets across the country. The NCCI reported
that the families facing fragile economic conditions (especially if their
male member/s, who are mostly synonymous to the
major or sole breadwinner of the family, are killed in the conflict) often
send their children to beg on streets as a mean of supplementing their
income. Whereas, Cedric Turlan, the information officer of the NCCI, said that
some families also send their children to work, and this also to sustain
their livelihood or at least to feed themselves. Child beggars
proliferate in Baghdad UN Integrated
Regional Information Networks IRIN, www.irinnews.org/report/70089/iraq-child-beggars-proliferate-in-baghdad [accessed 10 March
2015] His father fell ill
and could not work so he sent his children out to beg. If they did not come
home with enough money, he would beat them, Ahmed said. His father died of
kidney failure in April 2005.
"Now they are dead but my brothers treat us well. We are happy even
though we sleep in the open, in a garden with only two blankets. I hope one
day I will help all child beggars in Iraq," Ahmed said, grinning from
ear to ear before excusing himself and running after an expensive-looking
car. Ahmed is one of thousands of
homeless children throughout Iraq who survive by begging, stealing or
scavenging in garbage for food. Iraq: A Dangerous
Environment for Children Refugees
International, 07/01/2003 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 31 May
2011] Although the war in
Institute for War
& Peace Reporting iwpr.net/?p=icr&s=f&o=167824&apc_state=heniicr2003 [access date
unavailable] iwpr.net/global-voices/iraqs-outcasts [accessed 17
December 2016] Many orphans and
other poor children are forced into begging and prostitution. These children have joined the growing army
of street children who scrape and beg for a living in a city that is flooded
with weapons but has no government to impose law and order and deliver social
services. But in a city where few have
money, it is almost impossible to make a living on the street and most of the
children are barefoot, ragged and often appear to be starving. Dale Gavlak, Voice of www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2003/07/mil-030729-22e54398.htm [accessed 31 May
2011] In Saadoun neighborhood, we saw a real tragedy - children getting
raped all the time, girls and boys. There are organized gangs giving children
drugs, tablets, alcohol to make them drunk and
taking them to the hotels where they will be raped as payment, if you want to
have sex with a girl or a boy. Glimmer Of Hope For
BBC News, 20 May,
2003 news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3043241.stm [accessed 31 May
2011] Since 1991 a great
number have been abandoned by parents too poor to feed them, and the numbers
grew dramatically during the conflict earlier this year, after looters
attacked orphanages following the fall of New Premises For
Homeless Children In Capital UN Integrated
Regional Information Networks IRIN, www.irinnews.org/report/22448/iraq-new-premises-for-homeless-children-in-capital [accessed 10 March
2015] It seems like a
happy scene, but if you talk to the former street children, you will find
that many of them are disturbed and potentially violent. Under the former regime, the issue of
street-children was kept under wraps. Street Whys? Catherine Arnold, www.baghdadbulletin.com/pageArticle.php?article_id=152&cat_id=2 [accessed 31 May
2011] They appreciate the
security, the food and the activities we offer, but the settling in process is
very difficult especially if they are used to complete freedom. They are
usually illiterate and have little conception of accepted behavior. Our
difficulty is to know what to do with the older ones who are legally of age
but who remain vulnerable War Child At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly also be accessible [here] [accessed 31 May
2011] With support
systems almost non-existent, many children find themselves falling through
the net completely and end up living on the streets. These kids - mostly boys, but girls too -
come from homes broken by the first Gulf War, or orphaned by the second, but
these children have survived to live a brutalized existence. A day in a life on the streets offers a
vicious reality - crime, bloody violence, sexual abuse (and attendant
diseases) and an ever-increasing drug culture. Lives Less Ordinary Track track.cf.ac.uk/iraq.html [accessed 31 May
2011] Kevin and Helen
went to UNICEF wary of
post-war child trafficking in Iraq UNICEF Press Centre,
www.unicef.org/newsline/2003/03nn50iraqtrafficking.htm [accessed 13
February 2011] Noting a flurry of
news reports indicating an increase in the number of children on the streets
in UNICEF warns that
while street children are a concern in Iraq, there is no overnight solution.
The issue of street children is a very recent phenomenon in Iraq. Prior to
the 1991 Gulf War, the problem simply did not exist, and it will take time to
reverse this trend. –
htsc New NGO Helps
Street Children In Valentinas Mite, Radio Free
Europe/Radio www.rferl.org/content/article/1053439.html [accessed 31 May
2011] "I am 14 years
old. My mother [left my father and started living with another man], and my father
took us away from our mother and then he started beating us. And then I ran
away." -- Kutaiba, a homeless Iraqi boy
Thousands of homeless children are living
on the streets of the Iraqi capital As Street Violence
Flares In Lutheran World
Relief, At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly also be accessible [here] [accessed 31 May
2011] The project, which
depends on local organizations and staff, will repair a shelter that provides
street children in north 'All Our Children'
Approves New Projects for Church World
Service/National Council of Churches CWS/NCC, www.ncccusa.org/news/0404allourchildren.html [accessed 31 May
2011] In one project,
Church World Service (CWS) and its consortium partners approved repairs to
the Bait al Tuful social institution, which
provides shelter and care for street children. Working with Enfants du Monde and the Iraqi Ministry of Labor and
Social Affairs (MOLSA), the institution serves as a transitional place where
children have access to education, hygiene and protection. All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this webpage as: Patt,
Prof. Martin, "Street Children - |
