Children suffered record levels of violence in conflict zones in 2024, UN report shows
The UN security council's annual report on children and armed conflict found 22,495 children in 2024 were killed, wounded, denied humanitarian support or recruited for conflict.
It highlighted a 44% rise in attacks on schools and 35% rise in sexual violence against children.
'This must serve as a wake-up call. We are at the point of no return,' said Virginia Gamba, the special representative of the UN secretary general for children and armed conflict. 'Children living amid hostilities are being stripped of their childhood. Instead of recognising the special protection afforded to children, governments and armed groups around the world blatantly ignore international law that defines a child as anyone under 18.'
The report verified 41,370 incidents of violations against children – including 5,149 that occurred earlier but were only verified in 2024 – with 4,856 in Gaza, primarily carried out by the Israeli security forces, including killings, injuries and the denial of permits for medical treatment. It verified 22 cases of Palestinian boys being used by Israeli forces as human shields in Gaza and five in the occupied West Bank.
It also highlighted rises in violence against children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Somalia, Nigeria and Haiti.
The number of incidents was the highest since the UN began verifying reports in 1996. The report also said there was an increase in the number of children suffering multiple violations, from 2,684 in 2023 to 3,137 in 2024, especially in cases where abductions, recruitment and sexual violence converged.
'To normalise this level of violence against children is to accept the dismantling of our collective humanity. The level of alarm is unprecedented. Governments must act immediately to turn the tide of grief, trauma and loss borne by children,' said Helen Pattinson, CEO of War Child UK.
Of more than 4,000 incidents recorded in DRC, more than half involved children being recruited by armed groups.
There was also a 35% rise in sexual violence against children in 2024, with almost 2,000 cases. More than a quarter were recorded in Haiti, with 406 cases of rape and 160 involving gang rape. There were 419 cases of sexual violence in Nigeria, 358 in DRC and 267 in Somalia.
The report said it was concerned by the 'dramatic' rise in gang rape and the abduction of girls for sexual slavery, which it said highlighted how sexual violence against children was being used as a weapon of war.
Inger Ashing, CEO of Save the Children International, said sexual violence 'must be treated with the same gravity as guns and bombs'.
'Sexual violence against children in conflict is a crime which once took place in the shadows but is now more and more becoming used as an overt tactic of war,' said Ashing.
'No one should have to endure the pain and humiliation of rape and sexual exploitation and violence, and it is particularly deplorable when a child is subjected to this brutality.'
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