Mr. Chair, I would like to ask a question using a bit of a different lens. I would like to ask a question through the eyes of a child, our smallest witness to what is happening in Darfur. What we know about children and raising them well is that it is about raising healthy babies with love and early attachment, gentle touching, good nutrition, and gradual independence and so on.
When we look at what is happening to children in Darfur, we see the horrific circumstances in which they are living. While some parents there were being interviewed, children were given crayons and paper to play with on the floor. They were not given any instructions. Using their crayons, in the only language they had, not verbal language but “showing” language, those children showed the burning of their homes, the beating of their parents, and people being hungry. These were very crude drawings, but they were the language the children had, that the smallest witness had, to show us what was going on.
Let me say for the parliamentary secretary that I would ask for that visual vocabulary to be kept in the front of our minds because, despite three security resolutions, women and girls continue to be raped, water and food sources are being destroyed, and schools and hospitals are being burned to the ground. Children of 11 years of age are raising families. The needs of girl children in conflict and post-conflict situations are being totally overlooked. Even though they are victims, they are fighters, they are leaders and they are peacemakers who are often left to rebuild their shattered communities at the age of 10, 11 or 12. So through the eyes of those smallest witnesses, I would like to ask--