The ongoing emergency in Haiti is crushing children's chances of an education and a better future as scores of youngsters are recruited by heavily armed and violent gangs, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) warned on Friday.
UNICEF 's representative in Haiti, Geetanjali Narayan, told journalists that just last month, armed groups destroyed 47 schools in Haiti's capital Port-au-Prince, adding to the 284 schools destroyed in 2024.
"The relentless attacks on education are accelerating, leaving hundreds of thousands of children without a place to learn," she said.
Speaking in Geneva, Ms. Narayan described reports of "yet another attack" on Thursday. "Videos capture piercing screams of children lying on the floor, motionless with fear," she said, calling the scene a "chilling reminder that these attacks do damage far beyond the classroom walls".
"A child out of school is a child at risk," she warned.
UNICEF previously reported a 1,000 per cent increase in sexual violence involving children between 2023 and 2024 in the country. Children also comprise half of the record one million-plus displaced to date by the violence in Haiti.
Eight-year-old recruits
After sharing the latest displacement data, Ulrika Richardson, the UN's top aid official in Haiti, insisted on Thursday that youngsters continue to bear the brunt of the crisis.
UNICEF's Ms. Narayan stressed that last year, child recruitment into armed groups "surged by 70 per cent".
"Right now, we estimate that up to half of all armed group members are children, some as young as eight years old," she said.
The UNICEF representative described the different roles played by children within armed groups, depending on their age and gender. Eight to 10-year-olds are "used as messengers or informants" while younger girls are tasked with domestic chores.
"As they get older, the children are playing more and more active roles in terms of participating in acts of violence," Ms. Narayan said.
Asked about the impact of being recruited into a gang at an early age, she spoke of "indescribable" damage.
"At that age, the child's brain is still forming. They haven't developed their understanding of the world. And so, to be to be part of an armed group where you are surrounded by violence at all times and where you yourself may be forced to commit acts of violence, has a profound effect on the child," she said.
Ms. Narayan stressed that UNICEF is "working actively" to support the release, demobilization and reintegration of child armed group members.
