Children are increasingly the targets of armed conflict. Nearly half of the 3.6 million people killed in conflict during the 1990s (45 per cent) were children.

Millions more children were seriously injured or permanently disabled, or endured sexual violence, trauma, hunger and disease. Around 20 million children were forced from their homes and communities by conflict.

Hundreds of thousands of children have been forced to witness or take part in acts of violence. Not all children abducted or recruited into conflict bear arms; many are forced into sexual slavery, or to be cooks, servants, messengers or spies. Girls are particularly vulnerable.

Sexual violence is often a deliberate weapon of war. In Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, girls and women were raped as combat policy. Sexual violence was widespread in recent conflicts in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Darfur. Assaults continue in camps for people displaced by conflict.

Many countries in conflict also have high HIV prevalence, which helps create the conditions for rapid increases in infections. In Rwanda, 2,000 women, many rape survivors, were tested for HIV in the five years after the 1994 genocide. Of them, 80 per cent were found to be HIV-positive. Many had not been sexually active before the violence.

Systems that children rely on for safety often break down during armed conflict. Law enforcement institutions, schools and health facilities, families and communities, lose the structure and authority that they provide in peacetime.

Under-five death rates increase by 13 per cent in a typical five-year war. In the first five years of peace, the under-five mortality levels are around 11 per cent higher than pre-conflict. Sierra Leone, following a decade of civil war, has the highest absolute mortality rate for under-fives in the world – 284 children out of 1,000 do not survive to age five.

Landmines claim 15,000 – 20,000 victims each year, with at least one in five among them children. Children are at particular risk of injury and death from landmines because their small size, unfamiliar shape, and colors can make them look like toys.