BERLIN (Sputnik) — UN children’s agency UNICEF and Germany have enabled half a million vulnerable children in Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon to go to school, Germany’s economic development minister said Tuesday.
Gerd Mueller was speaking at a presentation of UNICEF’s 2016 state of the world’s children report, which warned of threats to health and education faced by children in hot spots.
"UNICEF is our assistance partner. In Syria alone, half a million children are studying at schools thanks to our cooperation," Mueller told journalists in Berlin.
The minister called on Europe and the international community to increase assistance to hundreds of thousands of refugee children whose future is still in jeopardy.
UNICEF estimates that almost 250 million children live in countries affected by armed conflicts. In Syria, 150,000 children under 5 years old have been internally displaced since the war started in 2011.