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BELGRADE - UNICEF has determined that one child in ten in Yugoslavia has been traumatized by last spring's NATO aggression and needs psychological help, President of the Yugoslav committee for cooperation with UNICEF Margit Savovic said Tuesday.
Addressing a conference of the Serbian Psychological Society on psychology and social upheavals, Savovic said that the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia had violated the fundamental children's right to life. Despite statements by NATO leaders that the strikes were directed against military targets, they were in fact directed against the civilian population, Savovic said.
Children in Yugoslavia were subjected to daily trauma and stress during the NATO strikes last spring. Of the 5,000 civilians killed in the aggression, 30 percent were children, who also accounted for 40 percent of the 10,000 wounded, she said.
The aggression also deprived children of their right to education. About 1.3 million children did not attend classes, over 300 schools and nurseries were destroyed, and 120,000 pregnant women did not receive proper medical care, Savovic said.
The war has brought about an increase in the numbers of handicapped children and orphans and in the incidence of delinquency, suicide and psychological troubles, she said.
As a signatory of the convention on children's rights and the world declaration on the survival, development and protection of children adopted at the World Children's Summit in 1990 in New York, Yugoslavia made a commitment to ensure a better future for all chidren, Savovic said.
However, the war that was imposed on Yugoslavia and the earlier wars in its neighborhood and years of economic sanctions have made the children of Yugoslavia the most endangered children in Europe, according to UNICEF evaluations, Savovic said.