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Sanaa: Child trafficking in Yemen is not a phenomenon, but it is a problem that must be solved, said a Yemeni minister.
"It is a burning problem that can't be ignored," Yemeni Minister of Social Affairs and Labour, Amat Al Razzaq Humad, told the upper chamber of parliament, Shura Council, which held a session on Wednesday to discuss the issue of labour and smuggling of children in the presence of all concerned bodies.
According to officials and statistics, 900 children were smuggled to Saudi Arabia during 2006 and about two million children do not go to school. The minister told the Shura Council that the street children were a 'time bomb'.
Ineffective
The Shura Council attributed the problems of smuggling children and child labour to the weakness of the official institutions concerned with children.
In the session devoted to discussing a report about the reality of children in Yemen, the Council demanded the official organisations play an effective role in protecting children from smuggling and labour.
The suffering of children in Yemen is not because of lack of resources but it is because these resources are not rationalised, other members said.
They mentioned some problems facing children including inadequate health care, malnutrition and violence.
The Minister of Social Affairs said her ministry is going to establish a new centre in Sanaa for dealing with children problems including receiving those children who are repatriated from Saudi Arabia after being smuggled.
"We held many talks with officials of Saudi Arabia to discuss the children trafficking in coordination with Unicef and we formed a joint technical committee," she said.
Deputy Minister of Education, Hassan Ba Awm, confirmed that there are about two million children who don't go to school.
He pointed out to the importance of investment in education by building schools to accommodate and educate all children.
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