Children are being affected more than ever before by violence from weapons, and worst of all, in Ukraine. The figures are frightening, and the circumstances under which they are occurring are worse again. 32,990 severe child abuses were substantiated on 22,557 children in 2023 alone, reports the UN Secretary-General’s Annual Report on Children and Armed Conflict. It is a number higher than a statistic—it’s akin to nearly 15 children killed every day, 11,649 killed or hurt overall.
The form of such abuses is changing and worsening. Children are being conscripted and sent to the front lines, kidnapped while going to school, and raped at school. Schools and hospitals-nationwide safe places—are daily being bombed by the military, and humanitarian relief workers are targeted as well. Explosive weapons used in city fighting have resulted in horrific numbers of casualties, as well as the scope of delivering assistance. In Ukraine, matters only worsened. The UN verified 1,914 serious child violations against 673 children in 2024, rising 105 percent from the preceding year, including 671 killings and injuries, primarily due to explosive munitions, and 862 attacks on educational and healthcare facilities. It also monitored eight detentions of children and the release of two kidnappings in 2022, although hundreds remain separated from their families.
Forced displacement and indoctrination are the main issues these days in the war in Ukraine. Russian forces, according to Kateryna Rashevska, a human rights legal expert at the Regional Center for Human Rights, documents forcibly deported at least 19,546 Ukrainian children since February 2022. The children were typically deprived of their Ukrainian identity, denied the right to speak their language, and were subject to political indoctrination as well as militarization. The International Criminal Court already indicted Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Commissioner for the Rights of the Child on such deportations as war crimes and ordered their arrest. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky repeatedly appealed to the international community, reminding everyone that Russia arrived in the name of Ukraine’s future, and without children, there will be no future.
The global response was strong but limited. Recent highest-level summit talks placed the future of Ukrainian children at the forefront of peace-making agendas. US President Donald Trump, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and EU leaders are all now on the table, with Trump having shown an openness to provide US security assurances to Ukraine once the war is done. CNN previously reported that Melania Trump wrote an open letter to Putin requesting him to “singlehandedly restore” the “melodic laughter” of children, pleading with him to help maintain Ukrainian children as innocent. European leadership had words in which nothing of Ukraine can be fixed without Ukraine itself, and Russia can’t veto Ukraine’s future within the EU or NATO.
All that diplomatic posturing put aside, the barriers are simply too formidable. Russian demands for land exchanges, freezing lines, and cuts in Ukraine’s military confuse the negotiations. Everyone also wants to know how to achieve significant security guarantees for Ukraine, since the humanitarian situation is already being addressed. The UN Security Council urged attacks on civilian objects, schools, and hospitals to cease at once and issued an appeal to everyone to ensure safe delivery of humanitarian assistance. The UN Secretary-General appealed to Russia to engage with the UN in the reunification and return of Ukrainian children.
Humanitarian responders work around the clock, providing protection, reintegration, and psychosocial support. Over 10,600 ex-child members of armed forces or groups received reintegration assistance in 2023, not just vital to their individual health but to broader objectives of sustainable peace and social reintegration too. Humanitarian access rose by 32 percent, and schools and hospitals were bombed and resulting in less education and health service delivery to thousands of children.
The crisis doesn’t end at the borders of Ukraine alone. The most egregious abuses have been confirmed in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Democratic Republic of Congo, Myanmar, Somalia, Nigeria, and Sudan. Abduction, recruitment, and sexual exploitation are practiced predominantly by opposition armed groups, while government forces kill, injure, and destroy schools and hospitals.
The world has come to a point of decision. The situation of children affected by conflict demands a reaction, calling for governments, international institutions, and civil society to act even more. Children’s welfare, protection, and rights must be integrated into peace-building as an afterthought, and the world must act to prevent children from being used and recruited into conflict. Armed conflict does not even cross a child’s mind, and something must be done yesterday.
