United Nations, Oct 13 (AFP) With 500 attacks on schoolsdocumented in just six months, 2017 is shaping up as a recordyear for the number of schools bombed and destroyed in warzones like Yemen, South Sudan and Syria, a UN official saidtoday.
Last year, the United Nations was able to verify 753attacks on schools and hospitals in 20 countries wracked byconflict as the world body seeks to track the violence andfind ways to better protect children.
Virginia Gamba, the UN special representative forchildren in armed conflict, told an informal Security Councilmeeting that attacks appeared to be on the rise this year.
"It is no consolation that in the last six months alone,over 500 schools have already been attacked, which means wemight be able to break this record at the end of this year,"Gamba told the council.
Targeting schools or hospitals in armed conflicts isconsidered a violation of international humanitarian law and awar crime.
In just three months, from April to June, the UnitedNations has verified 174 attacks on schools in the DemocraticRepublic of Congo, most of which took place in the Kasairegion, Gamba said.
Last week, the United Nations put the Saudi-led coalitionfighting in Yemen on a blacklist of child rights violators forcarrying out 38 attacks on schools and hospitals in 2016,killing and maiming 683 children.
Three quarters of all attacks on schools in Yemen werecarried out by coalition air strikes, while in Syria, twothirds of them were bombardments by government forces or theirallies.
Gamba stressed that the number of attacks for last yearwas "much higher" because the report only focused on incidentsthat the United Nations was able to verify.
The United Nations found that army troops or rebel forcesused schools for military purposes in 15 of the 20 conflict-affected countries.
Describing a new pattern of attacks, Gamba said children,teachers and schools were being targeted because of thecurriculum content or because the school is seen as a symbolof state authority.
Schoolgirls are often killed in a bid to halt femaleeducation.
Joy Bishara, one of Nigeria's Chibok girls who managed toescape Boko Haram kidnappers in 2014, told the council thather attackers repeatedly said "do not go to school" and thatshe never felt safe there after her ordeal. (AFP)RB.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.