Unicef has issued a new alert about the condition of children in Mosul, Iraq, which has for months been the scene of a bloody battle against the Islamic State.
"We are receiving alarming reports from the western districts of Mosul, in Iraq. There are accounts of numerous children who have lost their lives in desperate attempts to flee the hell of war, which in recent hours has been intensifying."
The warning came on 5 June from Unicef: the international organisation explained that the minors still present in the portion of the Iraqi city held by the jihadists of the Islamic State are also "being used as human shields and in some cases forced to take part in the fighting." "Around one hundred thousand children – the United Nations agency added – are forced to live in conditions of extreme danger, trapped in the old city and other areas of west Mosul, where crossfire between the warring parties is sparing neither hospitals nor healthcare facilities."
For seven months now, the Iraqi army and the forces of the international coalition have been attempting to liberate the western districts, the last urban stronghold in Iraq held by Islamic fundamentalists. This has already caused the flight of over 750,000 people, who have left their homes since last October.
The result is that many areas have now become "no man's land". For weeks, men, women and children have been making their way along, for example, the main avenue of the al-Rifai neighbourhood in west Mosul, loaded down with large bags or dragging overflowing wheelbarrows. Clothes, pictures, crockery, furniture. Some are even dragging a ceiling fan: "But these are not people fleeing with their belongings — they are looters plundering abandoned homes," international press reports. The collateral effects of a bloody and grinding war.
On 2 June, the Baghdad army announced that it had liberated a large part of Mosul: the fiercest fighting is now concentrated in the neighbourhoods of Al-Shifaa, Al-Saha and Al-Zinjili. General Haidar al-Obeidi of the elite counter-terrorism forces explained that "soldiers have for now avoided entering the maze of winding alleyways of the old city, both because of logistical difficulties and because of the large number of civilians still present in the area".
Meanwhile, in east Mosul life is slowly returning to normal. A report by French broadcaster France Info described residents attempting to reorganise their lives. Some shops, for instance, are beginning to open again: "We can sell women's underwear again, ties and even T-shirts with English writing on them. All of this was forbidden when the neighbourhood was under Isis control," said one trader.
A barber says he has been able to practise his trade freely again: "Before, the jihadists had imposed the same haircut on everyone and banned the shaving of beards. I also refused to send my children to school: I saw their maths exercise books, in which they were taught arithmetic by adding up boxes of ammunition or bombs."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKseZzSL2jM
But the echo of the nearby war comes through loud and clear: a man who has just fled west Mosul speaks of "dozens of civilian burials a day. Isis fighters fire their mortar rounds from the rubble where families are hiding. When the international coalition retaliates, it kills everyone. It is a massacre".