Big Arrow sez, More Iraqi Kids going to school, huh??

BrownShark

Banned
NEWS ARABWORLD</SPAN></SPAN>Violence empties schools in IraqBy Maher Al-Jasem in Al-Anbar province In an ordinary year, schools throughout Iraq would have opened for classes on September 20, but this year many in the country are left empty, as schoolchildren are kept at home by the violence that has plagued Iraq's streets.
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Armed groups have asked parents to keep children at homeIn Ramadi, members of armed groups calling themselves the Iraqi resistance distributed fliers asking parents to keep their children at home until all US security checkpoints had been removed from the city.

Mohammed Noor, an Arabic language teacher at one of the secondary schools, told Aljazeera that the fliers also claimed that US military personnel had occupied some of the schools in the past few months and that schoolchildren should refrain from registering for classes "until the people of Ramadi are rid of their presence".

Ramadi is a city virtually under siege as it has been the battleground between armed groups and US forces.
Fierce fighting has kept many of the streets closed to all traffic – in some districts the city looks deserted.
Streets such as Al-Maarith, Muhafatha and Al-Iskan, on which many schools are located, have also been cordoned off by US forces, leaving families with no choice but to keep their children at home.
Noor said: "When you want to pass these areas you have to carry a white banner, otherwise American snipers may deal with you as terrorists and shoot you without any hesitation … they are perched on the buildings over the streets."

Wages unpaid
Further exacerbating the situation, many teachers have not been paid wages, a school director told Aljazeera on the condition that his name not be published.
He said: "US forces are everywhere – on the streets, manning checkpoints, the former police headquarters – it is dangerous."
He explained that it had become a challenge having someone distribute wages in Ramadi, Hiyt and Haditha, as well as other cities in the western Anbar province.
"The person with our wages could be hijacked on the roads or killed by US forces."
Roads to and from Ramadi have been so dangerous that the results of final exams taken by Ramadi secondary school students have yet to arrive from the Al-Selakh district of Baghdad's Rusafa region.
For now, for the students of Ramadi at least, school's out for the rest of the year.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
If the American occupation of Iraq is building a school system on the same failed model as the US school system, maybe there is a silver lining to this alledged dark cloud!

We should be sending them Home Schooling materials, cirriculum and computers. Opps, can't do that. Might breed a generation of free and independent thinkers who neither choose American Empire or Radical Islam. Imagine such a tragedy!

:wink2:
 

brett636

Well-Known Member
Perhaps you could provide us with a link for that news article. My guess is that your article is more than 3 years old.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member

BrownShark

Banned
Published on Monday, January 7, 2008 by CommonDreams.org The Humanitarian Crisis for Iraq’s Children Continues

by Claudia Lefko

I imagine I am not alone in despairing at the end of the year. While others look forward, I am haunted by what we did not accomplish in 2007. Particularly devastating is the ongoing war and occupation in Iraq, and the toll it continues to take on all of us, but particularly on the civilian population in Iraq, most especially on children.
I was humbled to receive a holiday greeting from Dr. Salma in Baghdad with her wish for peace in 2008. How do these Iraqis continue to hold onto hope! Then came an appeal and photographs from southern Iraq, asking me to support a non-violence training project. Children and youth in Al-Samawa are being asked to turn in their toy guns for balls and other toys. The photographs showed two men and a long line of children holding their toy guns. Next to them you see the balls and the pile of already cashed-in guns. Again, I am moved. What resilience in this gesture, given the depth of the problem facing parents in Iraq and in other war zones around the world.
I spent Christmas 2003 working on an art exchange project and taking photographs of children on Dr. Salma’s cancer ward in a pediatric hospital in Baghdad. One day I was confronted by a small child wielding a toy gun, and gesturing for a photograph. I stopped and stared at the child in horror, a sinking feeling sweeping over me as he struck his pose and waited for the click of my shutter. I realized immediately that this would be a photograph with a “message”: this is what happens to children growing up surrounded by war and violence.
But what message would I give the child by taking this photograph? I would be affirming his pride in the toy gun, giving my unspoken support, my consent. I would legitimize his war game, which, like all children’s games, is practice in preparation for a future in an adult world. I didn’t want to immortalize an Iraqi child in this horrifying posture. I turned and walked away, leaving him standing in obvious disappointment.
A year later a friend handed me the January 22, 2007 Newsweek Magazine with “my photograph” on the cover. A small, serious looking Iraqi boy poses with a toy gun and stares from a white background. Above his head, in bold letters the caption: The Next Jihadists.
Inside, on page 24, is a fold- out photo of 13-year-old Ammar with his –real–Kalashnikov assault rifle. In letters that take up nearly half the facing page the title reads: Iraq’s Young Blood. It was another sickening moment for me. There was “my” photograph, but the gun is real. And the message not so much a sad lament about the tragedy of what is happening to Iraq’s children, as a warning against them.
Iraq’s children need to be rescued, not feared. They are the best hope and most important resource of any country, yet they continue to suffer and die out of sight and out of mind of most of us. SAVE the Children’s report: State of the World’s Mothers 2007, Saving the Lives of Children Under 5 shows Iraq continues to have the highest Under 5 mortality (U5MR) of any country in the world. Since the first Gulf War, the U5MR has increased a staggering 150%. It is estimated that one out of every eight children in Iraq dies before their fifth birthday: 122,000 children died in 2005.
According to UNICEF, some two million children “…continued to face threats including poor nutrition, disease and interrupted education” in 2007. Only 20% of Iraqi children outside of Baghdad have access to safe drinking water or proper sewage treatment facilities. Seventeen percent of Iraqi children are permanently out of primary school and an estimated 220,000 more are missing school because they and their families have been displaced. These are in-country figures and don’t include the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children and youth whose education is interrupted or ended because their families have fled to other countries.
Children are developing, each stage of their growth and development is a critical building block that enables them to reach the next stage. In order to achieve their potential–physically, emotionally, intellectually–their needs must be met at each stage. The lack of food, clean water, shelter, education and access to health care adds up to–at best– a compromised future.
Somehow, this ongoing crisis for Iraqi children continues to escape the mainstream media. Iraq is a never ending sporting event, with sides developing strategies, making gains and suffering set backs. The real losses suffered by Iraqi children, day after day and year after year are rarely added up and taken into account and almost never reported on.
“Children are both our reason to struggle to eliminate the worst aspects of warfare, and our best hope for succeeding at it.” wrote Graca Machel, the author of a seminal assessment and call to action on their behalf. The UN accepted The Impact of Armed Conflict on Children in a unanimous resolution in 1996. The report affirms the right to special protection and care for children caught in war and conflict zones and reaffirms their rights under international treaties. Iraqi children–and all children in war zones–need the international community to stand by its commitments, and deliver the protection and care that is guaranteed them under international law. Maybe, 2008 will see some much needed action on their behalf.
 

BrownShark

Banned
Violence in Iraq disrupts lives and education

ibc_iraq_education131.jpg
© UNICEF

Iraq/2008/Robaye'eUNICEF–funded water tankers bring water to the city of Basra after weeks of curfews and violence.

By Claire Hajaj
AMMAN, Jordan, 21 April 2008 – In recent weeks, families in Basra and Baghdad’s Sadr City have been plunged into one of the most violent episodes in Iraq’s recent history. As Iraq’s security forces mobilized against militia groups, widespread clashes and curfews kept families trapped indoors and led to shortages of water, food and medical supplies.
While life is slowly returning to normal in Basra, fighting is ongoing in Sadr City. Life for children there has become harder and more frightening. Addressing shortages of water and medical supplies in Sadr City are immediate humanitarian priorities.
Clashes between militias and military forces have shut down many parts of the city for days on end, affecting thousands. Some curfews have lifted, but fear of roadside bombs is still keeping many families at home.
Schools should be a haven
Education is also under threat. Most of the city’s primary and secondary schools are closed. More than 20 schools have been reported damaged in the violence, with unconfirmed numbers of students and teachers killed.
UNICEF is calling for schools to be protected as a priority.



ibc_iraq_education132.jpg
© UNICEF

Iraq/2008/Robaye'eFor weeks, Basra’s residents were unable to leave their homes to get water or attend school.
According to reports from people on the ground, some empty schools are hosting families who have been displaced. Still others may be in use by military forces.
“Schools are a haven for children in times of conflict,” said UNICEF Iraq Chief of Education Mette Nordstrand. “They are protected under international law as zones of peace. No matter what the circumstances, the only proper use for an Iraqi school is to educate and protect Iraqi children.”
Delivering water and supplies
Alongside its humanitarian partners, UNICEF has been assisting children in Basra and Sadr City since the crisis began. A UNICEF-supported water-tankering operation for districts in Basra reached families despite an ongoing curfew, providing the first fresh water many had seen in days.
UNICEF has since delivered health supplies for 12,000 people to Basra’s hospitals and is beginning to assist schools, which only reopened a few days ago.
In Sadr City, UNICEF’s tankering operations have delivered 2.1 million litres of water to deprived families living on the city’s outskirts and reached hospitals inside the city itself. Some 12,000 families have received water-purification tablets to treat their household water supply, while tablets for 4,200 more families in need have been delivered to local health officials.
“We are making the most of the access we have right now and are working hard despite the security problems to bring some relief to families,” said UNICEF Emergency Specialist Luciano Calestini. “However, the psychological impact on children will be far harder to heal. It is absolutely critical that they see an end to this violence and can get back into school as soon as possible.”
 

tieguy

Banned
Violence in Iraq disrupts lives and education

ibc_iraq_education131.jpg
© UNICEF

Iraq/2008/Robaye'eUNICEF–funded water tankers bring water to the city of Basra after weeks of curfews and violence.

By Claire Hajaj
AMMAN, Jordan, 21 April 2008 – In recent weeks, families in Basra and Baghdad’s Sadr City have been plunged into one of the most violent episodes in Iraq’s recent history. As Iraq’s security forces mobilized against militia groups, widespread clashes and curfews kept families trapped indoors and led to shortages of water, food and medical supplies.
While life is slowly returning to normal in Basra, fighting is ongoing in Sadr City. Life for children there has become harder and more frightening. Addressing shortages of water and medical supplies in Sadr City are immediate humanitarian priorities.

Ah yes Claire hajaj another do gooder trying to justify her existence by lamenting all those shortages in Iraq. Couldn't be because she is trying to keep the money and support flowing to unicef?
 

Overpaid Union Thug

Well-Known Member
So, BrownShark pulls a couple of links out of his arse that describes difficulty in a couple of areas in Iraq and that automatically paints the over all picture of how things are at each and every town and village in Iraq? LOL! And that folks is how the Liberal misinformation machine works! LOL! So, I guess if I link us to an article about a failing school system in Detroit then that must mean the entire country is failing too? LOL!
 

Bad Gas!

Well-Known Member
So, BrownShark pulls a couple of links out of his arse that describes difficulty in a couple of areas in Iraq and that automatically paints the over all picture of how things are at each and every town and village in Iraq? LOL! And that folks is how the Liberal misinformation machine works! LOL! So, I guess if I link us to an article about a failing school system in Detroit then that must mean the entire country is failing too? LOL!


Good points bud-drow!
 

BrownShark

Banned
So, BrownShark pulls a couple of links out of his arse that describes difficulty in a couple of areas in Iraq and that automatically paints the over all picture of how things are at each and every town and village in Iraq? LOL! And that folks is how the Liberal misinformation machine works! LOL! So, I guess if I link us to an article about a failing school system in Detroit then that must mean the entire country is failing too? LOL!

Big Arrow,

Post some good ones so support your case of things getting better in all provinces...

You say a couple of bad areas, alright, show me the good ones..

Peace.:peaceful:
 
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