Sunday, February 05, 2012

Children freezing in Afghanistan refugee camps


Photo:   Children gathered around a fire last week in the Nasaji Bagrami refugee camp in Kabul, where 14 Afghan infants have frozen to death in the past month.  Andrea Bruce/ NYT 

FROM NYT ARTICLE: 
The following children froze to death in Kabul over the past three weeks after their families had fled war zones in Afghanistan for refugee camps here:
¶ Mirwais, son of Hayatullah Haideri. He was 1 ½ years old and had just started to learn how to walk, holding unsteadily to the poles of the family tent before flopping onto the frozen ridges of the muddy floor.
¶ Abdul Hadi, son of Abdul Ghani. He was not even a year old and was already trying to stand, although his father said that during those last few days he seemed more shaky than normal.
¶ Naghma and Nazia, the twin daughters of Musa Jan. They were only 3 months old and just starting to roll over.
¶ Ismail, the son of Juma Gul. “He was never warm in his entire life,” Mr. Gul said. “Not once.”  It was a short life, 30 days long. 

One out of every seven children in the Kabul camps will not survive until his or her sixth birthday.

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