Children

Publisher:  Amnesty International Publications
Year Published:  1982
Pages:  30pp   Price:  1.50   Resource Type:  Serial Publication (Periodical)
Cx Number:  CX2394

Children is published by Amnesty International (AI). The publication reveals violations of some of the most fundamental human rights.

Abstract: 
Children is published by Amnesty International (AI). The publication reveals violations of some of the most fundamental human rights. Citing examples from around the world, AI relates a number of highly disturbing accounts of the victimization of children by repressive regimes.

This victimization occurs in many ways. Some children are arrested (along with their mothers) and are either tortured or killed at the hands of the armed forces or police. Many children have been separated from parents who had become prisoners or refugees. Some children suffer from "an enormous psychological burden of insecurity," the result of the arrest and imprisonment of one or both of their parents." There are also cases of women bearing children while in prison; these children later disappear without a trace. Some young people have become political prisoners as children and have been held for more than a dozen years without charge or trial.

One example illustrates the horror of these AI accounts. A pregnant woman, abducted as a political prisoner in Argentina, was tortured prior to childbirth. Part of this torture included the beating of her abdomen with an iron bar. Later she "gave birth to a son in prison. During labour, which lasted for about five hours, she was tied to a bed by her hands and feet and was completely unattended until the last few minutes. Her newborn baby was forced to sleep on the floor of the cell." AI stresses that cases such as the above "stand symbolically for children everywhere whose early life is scarred by such acts of intolerance and cruelty."

AI encourages the participation of anyone wishing to join AI and write letters specifically on behalf of children who have become victims of state persecution. They should contact (at the above Canadian address) Martha Aksim (Children's Appeal Network).