The international organization Save the Children said that there are about 200 million children currently living in the most deadly war zones in the world, the highest toll in a decade.
The British-based non-governmental organization said in a report published on Tuesday that the number of children in conflict areas in 13 countries jumped about 20% in 2020 compared to 162 million in 2019, the second highest number ever since 2008, when their number reached 208 million.
The report attributed the sudden rise in part to the outbreak of violence in Mozambique and the ongoing conflicts in Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria and Yemen, which are already facing life-threatening crises of hunger.
"The sharp increase in 2020 shows that the pandemic the world is facing and the United Nations' call for a ceasefire were not enough to stop these wars," the report said.
The organization also revealed in its report that there are 337 million children living near armed groups and government forces that recruit children, a threefold increase from what it was three decades ago.
"The number of countries in which child soldiers are recruited - and in which more than half of the world's children live (nearly 1.3 billion) - also jumped to 39, the highest number in 30 years," she added.
The report indicated that Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, the Philippines and Iraq have the highest percentage of children living near armed forces or groups that have recruited children.
Girls made up 15% of recruitment cases reported by the United Nations in 2020, and were often forced to "work as spies, lay mines and explosive devices, or as suicide bombers because they are less likely to get noticed".
Inger Aching, president of Save the Children International, said it was "terrifying" to see "more children caught in the crossfire of the deadliest war zone".
He added, "Even the global pandemic was not enough to stop the atrocities and brutal wars."
