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Jesuit Refugee Service - Press Release
Human Rights Day, 10 December
JRS urges international
community to invest
in refugee children
Education is key
to a stable future
Sixty
years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, millions of refugee and other forcibly displaced
children continue to be denied the most fundamental human
rights, including access to appropriate educational
opportunities.
In commemoration of Human Rights Day, 10 December, JRS urges the
international community to take steps to ensure that all
displaced children, regardless of their financial situation or
legal status, are guaranteed access to quality education.
Although individual governments bear the primary responsibility
for meeting their educational needs, it is the responsibility of
all states to support the efforts of those countries unable to
meet these needs with their own resources.
“Where education is available to refugees, most often in camp
settings, the quality of schooling is often poor. School
buildings are usually inadequate and didactic materials are
either lacking or nonexistent. Most troubling is the lack of
qualified teachers. Investment in the physical infrastructure of
schools and teaching quality is urgently needed” urged JRS
International Director, Peter Balleis SJ.
Throughout the developing world, JRS comes across displaced
parents living in poverty forced to choose between paying for
their children’s education and buying basic essentials. Even
when education is nominally free, teachers’ salaries are often
not paid, so families are forced to contribute. Too often,
refugee parents, unable to afford the costs of their children’s
education, are forced to take them out of school. Unfortunately,
those in the most vulnerable circumstances suffer
disproportionately, including girls and children with
disabilities. In fact, an estimated 98 per cent of children with
disabilities in the developing world, many of them victims of
conflict and landmine incidents, do not attend school.
As JRS staff well know, the problem of access to education is
not limited to developing countries. Shockingly, thousands of
children are held in detention centres in industrialised
nations, as well as developing states, without the possibility
of going to school. While some children receive classes in
closed centres, their extended confinement risks causing
psychological harm and impaired cognitive development. Upon
release, many children continue to be denied an education by
their precarious economic circumstances. In some European
countries, such as France, forcibly displaced parents are afraid
to send their children to school for fear that they may be
arrested and detained once again.
“The appalling lack of appropriate educational opportunities
to displaced children now will adversely affect both the
children and their countries in the future. A generation of
children is being lost. Given educational opportunities, they
have the potential to rebuild their lives, to help rebuild their
communities and thus to strengthen and stabilise their countries
for generations to come” added Fr Balleis.
Contact
information
James Stapleton - International Communications Coordinator;
tel:
+ 39 06 68 977390;
 +
39 346 234 3841;
email:
international.communications(a)jrs.net;
www.jrs.net
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