Nights in jail
Memories of a girl who survived war
(Name changed to protect identity)
“My name is Aliya. I am 8 years old. Six months ago, I returned from Syria with my mother and two sisters.
There was nothing to do in Syria ... I sat in a tent [1] and drew houses where I dreamed of living with my family in safety and sleeping tight. Sometimes I played outside.
Every night the military would break into our house and turn everything upside down. They would take away our belongings and hurt us. One day they found a phone in our tent. They blindfolded our mom and placed all of us in a dark room. It was cold and scary there. It was a jail. There were thin mattresses on the floor where we slept with ten other women and twenty-two children. There was a toilet in the corner of the room. It was tight and crowded there. We were not fed regularly. It was very difficult for us to survive the cold without food. Our mom cried all day and night.
After three months we were released from jail and brought to a camp. On our way to the camp, a bomb exploded in front of me. The surrounding houses were on fire. I got very scared.
After some time in the camp, my mother received a letter saying that we have a chance to return to Uzbekistan. We packed our belongings, got on the bus, and left. This is how we ended up in Uzbekistan. I like it here. I go to school and hang out with my friends”, Aliya.
Aliya, her sisters, and her mother were repatriated from Syria in April 2021 as part of the state operation Mehr-5. All Mehr operations were carried out by Uzbekistan at the initiative of the country's government to return women and children from armed conflict zones to their homeland.
The terrible events that children face in armed conflicts - bombings, the death of loved ones, hunger, and violence, do not pass without a trace. The resulting injuries affect their physical and mental health and disrupt their development and well-being. Assistance and support for children who have returned from armed conflict zones is needed for a long time. The most important factor for successful reintegration and adaptation is a loving family and a supportive community.
Aliya and her sisters now attend school and extra classes to catch up with the curriculum. After arriving in Tashkent, specialists from the Republican Centre for Social Adaptation of Children supported the girls in their reintegration process, including support to improve their physical and mental health. The girls are doing relatively well, including at school, and in the relationships with their classmates.
Aliya's family has been supported within the project funded by the European Union "EU-UN support to the states of Central Asia for their citizens who have returned from the zones of armed conflicts, primarily Syria and Iraq".
[1] Tent at the refugee camp
