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CHILDREN SRI LANKA:
OVERCOMING A LEGACY OF VIOLENCE
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| “...Today, in every single country throughout the world, there are many children silently suffering the effects and consequences of violence….This violence takes many different forms: between children on streets, at school, in family life and in the community… We wish to contribute to reduce their suffering. We believe that each child can discover, by himself, that violence is not inevitable. We can offer hope, not only to the children of the world, but to all of humanity….” |
| from “The Appeal of the Nobel Peace Laureates for the Children of the World” |
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The State of Sri Lankan Children
A Few Sobering Statistics
Est. Population: 20.9 million
Children Under 14: 5.1 million
Est. Displaced Persons: 450,000
Orphaned Children 310,000
Children in Commercial Sexual
Exploitation 2,000 35,000
Child Soldiers * 1,000 3,000
Suicide rate (ages 15‐24) 62.5
(one of the highest in the world) (per 100,000)
Low birth weight infants (1998‐2005) 22%
Children < 5 underweight (1996‐2005) 29%
Sources: CIA WorldFactBook; UNICEF Humanitarian
Action Report 2007; ILO ‐ International Programme
on the Elimination of Child Labor, “Report on Sri
Lanka: the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of
Children, A Rapid Assessment”; Human Rights
Watch; UNICEF
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Aiding Children in Need
Beginning in 2006 the Peace Appeal began a humanitarian initiative to complement our peacebuilding work, in recognition of the tremendous cost of conflict in Sri Lanka, and its particularly heavy toll on the most vulnerable in society, children. Our work coincided with the recognition that peace efforts in the region were being subsumed by the strategy of the Sri Lankan government to pursue a military victory over the LTTE, a strategy that was concluded in the Spring of 2009 with the Government’s victory over the LTTE. The victory has resulted in a massive humanitarian emergency, with nearly 300,000 internally displaced persons currently held in camps run by the government, and thousands of children made homeless and orphaned by the conflict.
Our efforts to assist children in need began in the Fall of 2006, when the Peace Appeal’s Sandy van Dort began a survey of children’s homes and orphanages throughout Sri Lanka with the goal of identifying institutions with strong leadership, but significant needs, who were aiding vulnerable Sinhalese and Tamil children. As of 2005, there were only 255 officially recognized homes for children in the records of Sri Lanka’s National Child Protection Agency, though many dozens of other facilities exist to meet the needs of children.
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| These homes offer hope to only a fraction of children left homeless and vulnerable. In the wake of the last months of the war, their operations have been stretched to the breaking point, with small facilities being asked to care for hundreds of new children made homeless by the violence of the last months of the conflict. Given the overwhelming needs of children in the country, our staff has focused on twin goals, first documenting the dimensions of the need by visiting orphanages throughout the country, collecting information and publishing and circulating them among our networks, and secondly identifying selected institutions, with strong leadership and values, where our direct support make a critical difference |
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Aiding Children in Need
Our first efforts began in 2006 with the support of two orphanages in North Central Sri Lanka, initially housing 102 children (66 girls and 36 boys), from both Sinhalese and Tamil families. The two homes were founded in 1999 by a dynamic Sri Lankan priest, Pastor Rodney. With the government unable to provide support to more than a fraction of children's homes in the country, the two homes must rely on alms, local support and international donations. They are staffed by a small number of extraordinary women 4 of whom support the 66 girls, and another 4 of whom support the 36 boys. An Australian parish has stepped in to provide partial support to cover basic needs, but the homes were barely scrapping by when first visited by the Appeal's staff.
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| The conditions of the homes are simple. Currently, the girls sleep in one large room, on stiff wooden bunk beds and on mats on the floor. The sleeping arrangements for the boy’s home are the same. Construction of additional living quarters has stopped due to lack of funding. $15,000 is projected to be sufficient to complete the building. Lacking almost no amenities, the children and their caregivers must use what they have, creating extraordinary games and craft items out of local materials, from kites to dolls. |
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Currently the Appeal is providing grants of basic commodities each month. For the girl's home, June's grant included a list of 79 items, from rice to coconut oil, soap to bandages. The majority of items are food, medicine, and toiletries, though the Appeal has provided badminton sets and volleyballs, as well as shoes in past deliveries. Given the ongoing needs of the institutions, we are working to develop partnerships with church parishes and youth groups both in the US and overseas.
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Small Grants Make a Big Difference
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In the first year of the program, the Appeal has worked with Sri Lankan orphanages to identify critical needs that could be met through a small grants program. During this period the Peace Appeal made 19 grants to 6 homes.
Given funding constraints, our support in the past year has been focused on two homes, the Aroma Boys Home and the Aroma Girl’s Home. However in the wake of the government’s victory over the LTTE, and the resulting surge in demands for support to homeless children and orphans, we continue to reach out to church groups, aid agencies and others to link them to orphanages requesting assistance from us. In our own work, direct assistance is provided through a simple process. Each month, the staff at the homes prepare a list of current needs, ranging from basic foodstuffs, to medical supplies to clothing. They review these lists with the Appeal’s Sandy van Dort, and establish priorities, after which a purchasing plan is developed.
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At the end of the month, our staff rent a truck and drive to an industrial neighborhood near the Port of Colombo to make bulk purchases of food items at discount rates. Volunteers join for the loading and unloading, accompanying the truck on the 175 kilometer trek north to the Aroma Homes. The truck makes two stops to unload the month’s provisions, first at the Girl’s Home and then at the Boy’s home, both within a short driving distance of each other.
At the request of the staff and children at the homes, our staff visits include time devoted to educational and recreational activities, including music lessons to sports and arts and crafts. In response to an idea for a program that would link them with children from New England church groups, the children at Aroma have been preparing local handicrafts to send to the United States, hoping to exchange them with their counterparts in the US.
The children use whatever materials are at hand, whether it is wood, old cement, used light bulbs, clay, reeds, parts of coconut tree or paint and cloth to make extraordinary handicrafts.
The children use whatever materials are at hand, whether it is wood, old cement, used light bulbs, clay, reeds, parts of coconut tree or paint and cloth to make extraordinary handicrafts.
The results of their creativity have yielded a wonderful array of brightly colored items, from kites to collages, clay sculptures to dried flower arrangements. The joyful colors and care with which the children tend to their work belies their past struggles and current challenges.
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| SPONSORSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
Please consider sponsoring the basic needs for children suffering from the effects of conflict in Sri Lanka. The costs of monthly support for food and supplies currently average app. US$ 1,575 per month for either the Aroma Boy’s or Aroma Girl’s home. Please contact Derek Brown in the USA or Andre Howson or Sandy Van Dort in Sri Lanka for further information.
USA
Derek Brown
Peace Appeal Foundation
derekbrown at peaceappeal.org
Sri Lanka
Sandra van Dort or Andre Howson
Peace Appeal South Asia
sandy at peaceappeal.org, andre at peaceappeal.org
Blogs
www.childrensvoices.wordpress.org
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