UNICEF seeks USD 3.9b for 41m children in humanitarian crises

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) is seeking 3.9 billion U.S. dollars to help 41 million children in need of humanitarian aid in 59 countries, a UN spokesman said on Tuesday.

Stephane Dujarric, the spokesman, said the 41 million children affected by conflict and disaster lack access to safe water, nutrition, education, health and protection.

"UNICEF reports that today, more countries are embroiled in internal or international conflict than at any other time in the past three decades, threatening the safety and well-being of millions of children," he said, adding the 3.9-billion-dollar appeal was to support the agency's work in 59 countries in 2019.

The more than 34 million children living through conflict and disaster alone includes 6.6 million children in Yemen, 5.5 million children in Syria and 4 million children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), UNICEF said.

The agency said the five largest individual appeals are for Syrian refugees and host communities in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey (904 million dollars), Yemen (542.3 million dollars), the DRC (326.1 million dollars), Syria (319.8 million dollars), and South Sudan (179.2 million dollars).

Dujarric also pointed out that 2019 marks the 30th anniversary of the landmark Convention on the Rights of the Child and the 70th anniversary of the Geneva Conventions.