Children in Syria struggle to survive, live childhood

Introduction

Children in Syria are the most affected in the 12 year-long war due to its repercussions that deprived more than one million children of their fundamental rights to education, health care, decent life and playing. The war placed them in the face of hard social, economic, humanitarian challenges. Child labor is one of the most prominent challenges that face Syrian children and puts their lives and future in danger since they often work in jobs not suitable for their age, and harms their health, growth, welfare, and deprives them of their rights.

World Day Against Child Labour, observed on June 12 each year, is a chance to raise awareness of the seriousness of this problem and to work to put an end to it.

This report issued by the Monitoring and Documentation Department of North Press shows testimonies of five children who work in dangerous jobs unfit for their physique, interviews with nine of their relatives, in addition to workers in the social affairs authorities and NGOs operating in the three areas of control in Syria.

Work to survive

Ahmad al-Hussein, 16, an IDP from northern Hama who lives with his family in a camp near the city of al-Dana in Idlib Governorate, northwest Syria, stands every morning with his mobile cart in front of a school to sell beans, unable to hide his sorrow for not completing his education.

He said, “It breaks my heart when I see children playing in the schoolyard or when they go out to leave. I feel sorry for the state I am in.”

He noted that he is forced to work in order to afford his ill father’s medicine since he is the eldest. “I work to help my mother with expenses. She works in a tailor workshop to secure food for my siblings and afford my father’s medication,” he added.

Whereas Qays al-Mulhem, 13, an IDP from the city of Soran in the north of Hama, works on a daily basis from 07:00 am to 05:00 pm in loading and unloading goods from vehicles in a food store.

Al-Mulhem, who dropped out of school to work, receives a weekly wage of 20 Turkish Liras (equals about $ 0.85), which is considered “very low” compared to the hard work he does.

He said he is forced to work in this store because nothing else is available.

The situation in northeast Syria is not so different from the northwest. Syrians were not spared from the impact of the war and its consequences. Children work across all of Syria.

Mo’ayed al-Ibrahim, 16, from the town of Shaddadi in Hasakah Governorate, said he stopped attending school after the Islamic State (ISIS) controlled the region. They closed schools and prohibited students and teachers from going there.

Mo’ayed added that what led him to work was the absence of a breadwinner. His family consists of an elderly father and mother, six sisters older than him, and children younger than him. His father suffers from a herniated disc due to his previous physically demanding job as a daily laborer.

He added that he started to work “since 2018 with a wage that does not exceed 700 Syrian Pounds (SYP) per day in a kerosene stove repair shop in his village in his village.”

“I wish I go back to school and play with my friends. The difficult living conditions stand in my way and force me to work and stay away from school,” he concluded.

The situation is far worse in Syrian government-held areas where the economic conditions are harder, and the living conditions are deteriorating due to the low incomes compared to other regions.

In Damascus, Abdulrahman, 12, works in a car repair shop and is occupied with cleaning a piece of metal from grease, whereas he should have been doing exams in middle school at the time of the interview.

When we asked him why he was not at school, he answered, “The state granted us free education but did not give us milk for my little brother.” He added that his father’s salary is barely enough for food, that is why he works to help with the expenses. He has a younger brother who has not found a job in a car workshop to learn “a profession.” He used to sell bread in front of bakeries, but it is not possible anymore since they started to sell bread only with the ration card.

Hussam, 16, said after he finished middle school, he worked in a car shop that paid a higher income than his father’s, who is a history teacher. He receives a weekly wage of 70,000 SYP (equals about $ 8), in addition to some tips from customers, whereas his father’s monthly salary is only 130,000 SYP.

Abdullah al-Shami (pseudonym), a resident from Damascus, said he had to take his three children out of school “due to the high expenses I cannot afford anymore.”

Similar cases occurred in Suwayda in southern Syria. Mutaab Bushnaq, 40, a father of five children from the city of Shahba, said he took out his two sons, Ahmad, 10, and Jamal, 15, from school and sent them to work in a car repair shop to help him with the family’s expenses.

“I am very sad that they did not continue their education, but our living conditions are very harsh. I had two choices, either to continue their schooling and their younger siblings, which would require expenses I cannot afford, or to find them a job to provide for themselves and gain a skill that would benefit them in the future,” he added.

Scale of the phenomenon

Child labour has physical and psychological effects on children. Children suffer from physical and mental exhaustion, and lack educational opportunities and do not experience their childhood. It also hampers the development of children’s individual skills and abilities and puts them at risk of negligence and danger. The most notable jobs carried out by children in Syria are scavenging garbage looking for plastic, iron, and other materials to sell, working in the industrial zone, porters, peddlers, and car workshop assistants.

UN estimations suggest that the percentage of Syrian child laborers has reached over 25 percent of the total number of laborers in 12 years. Before the Syrian crisis, it was 10 percent, which means the number of working children doubled during the conflict.

A 2020 report documenting child labour in Suwayda, Salkhad, and Shahba showed 413 children working in the industrial zones of the three cities. It also revealed that 90 percent of child labor cases started due to fragile economic conditions while 10 percent related to the acquisition of skills to occupy professions, hoping to have sources of income, according to a previous statement given by Daliya Masoud, an employee in Junior Chamber organization, a civic organization in the city of Suwayda founded in 2012.

The researcher told North Press that these numbers show “High-risk rates in subjecting children to work beyond their physical and psychological ability, which is reflected both in their physical and mental development. “

The Monitoring and Documentation Department managed to contact an administrator in the Monitoring and Evaluation Office of the Social Affairs Board in the Salvation Government affiliated with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS, formerly al-Nusra Front) in Idlib.

The administrator noted that there is no specific percentage of child laborers in the city, but based on statistics obtained from offices, councils, and organizations, “it exceeded 37 percent in 2023 among the target group between the ages of 7 and 15, including 24 percent of females. It is expected that the percentage is bigger, but many factors obstruct the transparency of the statistical operations.”

He added, “The greater percentage of child labor among the target group is in the agriculture sector with 45 percent, followed by the service sector in restaurants, shops, construction, industry, in addition to begging and collecting plastic from dumpsters.”

He noted that children are more prone to exploitation compared to adults. The average income of children under the age of 15 does not exceed 30 Turkish Lira, almost $1,3 at best, whereas some are paid $ 15 per month.

In northeast Syria, Hindrin Sino, co-chair of the Social Affairs Board of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) in Hasakah Governorate, said the number of child laborers is huge, but there is no precise statistic. Sino noted that the AANES has tried to limit this phenomenon by conducting several projects, but they were not successful due circumstances of war and influxes of IDPs to northeast Syria.

She added, “There are solutions to overcome this problem and stop child labor, but this requires joint action among all AANES boards. In addition, there must be efforts by international organizations, particularly those dealing with children’s issues such as UNICEF, which must work to fight this phenomenon by doing joint work with the AANES.”

Prevention efforts in Syria

Although local and international organizations seek to put an end to child labor, their efforts are often unsuccessful. Working on this issue needs the cooperation of authorities who are already engaged in conflict with other parties, neglecting young generations struggling to survive.

According to a human rights activist working for a children’s organization in northeast Syria, the efforts of local organizations cannot cover so many children working. These organizations need to work with international actors to obtain funding and support from the authorities to implement projects that could effectively limit child labor and children leaving school.

She added, “I can say that the actual work of organizations now is related to awareness campaigns and several activities that child laborers refrain from joining and describe as useless and will not feed us bread.”

A worker in the Syrian Ministry of Social Affairs told North Press that the Ministry’s employees are always accused and held responsible for issues they did not play a role in making and have no ability to resolve or mitigate.

He wonders what the ministry can do if the employee’s income does not exceed $ 15 a month while living expenses can reach at least $ 200.

What can the ministry do if its budget is barely sufficient for the operation of some care facilities such as care homes and institutes? He added.

The long years of the crisis have created and doubled many social problems, which the ministry or any other facility will not be able to resolve unless there is a comprehensive solution for that crisis and a stop to the ongoing bloodshed at least.

Syrian laws are no longer implemented except in certain parts of the country, which prohibit child labor under the age of 15. Zaher Tuma, 44, a Syrian lawyer living in Damascus, said the laws and legislations concerning the protection of children and juveniles “do not rise to the required level.”

The Labour Act No. 17 of 2010, in addition to the 2020 People’s Assembly Act, prohibit the employment of a child under the age of 15. But Act 17, in its paragraphs, then allows the child to work for a maximum of six hours with the consent of his father or guardian.

The lawyer believes that “it is not possible to apply the compulsory law of education amid this breakdown and hunger experienced by the population; instead the government must assume its responsibilities and provide a decent life for the population.”

There are several international laws that aim to prevent child labor and protect children’s rights, such as the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child and the 1973 International Labor Organizations (ILO) Convention No. 138. These laws state the necessity of protecting children’s rights and guaranteeing access to their right to education, health care, and decent life. The implementation of these laws in Syria is difficult due to multiple controlling powers and war circumstances in the country.

The controlling powers in Syria must promote opportunities for children’s education, promote economic opportunities for families with difficult economic conditions, and develop new and modernized laws that prevent child labor. Organizations should work on expanding their awareness campaigns and operate with authorities to guarantee children’s access to their rights. Authorities and organizations must cooperate with international and regional organizations concerned with children’s affairs to exchange expertise and obtain sufficient funding to prevent this phenomenon.