Daily Times

The United Nations envoy charged with reporting on violations against children in conflicts around the world said Thursday that first and foremost she is worried about what´s happening to youngsters in war-torn Sudan, followed by Congo and Haiti.

Virginia Gamba told a news conference officially launching the secretary-general´s annual report and U.N. blacklist of violators that she is also very worried about children caught in Myanmar’s civil war and the spillover into neighboring Bangladesh. “For the future, on the horizon,” she said, “I´m worried about Somalia and Afghanistan.”

The report for the first time put both Israeli forces and Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad militants on the blacklist for violating children´s rights in 2023 during Hamas´ Oct. 7 surprise invasion of southern Israel and its massive military retaliation in Gaza that is ongoing. The U.N. also kept the Russian armed forces and affiliated armed groups on the blacklist for a second year over their killing and maiming of Ukrainian children and attacks on schools and hospitals in 2023. Gamba said she remains very concerned about the plight of children in the wars in Ukraine and in Gaza, as well as in the West Bank and Jerusalem. “But the ones that I´m really worried about for, let´s say, the rest of this year and beginning of next year, are first and foremost Sudan, particularly Darfur, and Chad because it is expanding,” she said.

Sudan plunged into conflict in mid-April 2023, when long-simmering tensions between its military and paramilitary leaders broke out in the capital Khartoum and spread to other regions including Darfur, which became synonymous with genocide and war crimes two decades ago. The U.N. says over 14,000 people have been killed and 33,000 injured.

Gamba said their “ferocious armed struggle” led to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces being put on the blacklist for killing and maiming, raping and committing other acts of sexual violence, as well as attacking schools and hospitals.