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February
25, 2002
Knudsen
to Talk About Afghan Children
CHICAGO
--- Christine Knudsen, a children and war specialist with Save the
Children, will talk about the children of Afghanistan at 6 p.m.
Monday, March 11, in Lincoln Hall at Northwestern University School
of Law, 357 E. Chicago Ave.
The
speech, "The Way Forward for Afghanistan’s Children: Insights
from Save the Children’s Experience," will kick off a
speakers series commemorating the 10th anniversary of the founding
of the Children and Family Justice Center of the Northwestern University
School of Law’s Bluhm Legal Clinic. The speech is free and
open to the public.
Knudsen
will share insights and expertise concerning the overwhelming problems
that Afghan children face, including two decades of war, three continuous
years of drought in northwest Afghanistan, hunger, mass migrations
and alarming child mortality rates due to disease and lack of proper
medicine. Much of the infrastructure of the country has been devastated,
and access to education and health care for women and children remains
limited.
"Children
are our world’s greatest resource, and our goal, since our
founding in 1992, is to improve and ensure the highest degree of
justice and legal advocacy for them," said Bernardine Dohrn,
director of the Children and Family Justice Center. "While
our work focuses primarily on the needs of children in Illinois
and the U.S., we have become increasingly involved in international
human rights issues."
Among
the statistics Knudsen will cite about Afghanistan and its children:
One
of every four children dies before his or her fifth birthday.
There are an estimated 10 million land mines – the equivalent
of roughly one for every child.
One in five children is born in a refugee camp.
Only 3 percent of girls and 39 percent of boys are enrolled in school.
Fifty thousand children are working on the streets of the capital,
Kabul.
In
her work with Save the Children, Knudsen has traveled to Pakistan
twice since Sept. 11 and will be going to Afghanistan in May.
A
70-year-old international child relief program, Save the Children
has been responding to the needs of Afghan children refugees since
1985. It delivers emergency supplies of food, shelter, fuel and
medicine and ensures children’s safety and well-being through
land mine awareness and health education. Save the Children also
implements programs that address long-term development needs such
as literacy, nutrition, health and economic security.
Knudsen,
a children and war specialist in the Children in Crisis Unit, joined
Save the Children in 1999. Prior to that, her field postings included
work with UNHCR (the UN Refugee Agency), in Chechnya and with Catholic
Relief Services in Burundi. Between field assignments, she also
spent one year as a researcher for the War-Torn Societies Project
of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development,
exploring the interaction of national and international actors in
post-conflict reconstruction.
The
Children and Family Justice Center, part of the Bluhm Legal Clinic
at Northwestern University School of Law, is a multifaceted children’s
law center that provides legal representation for children with
a wide variety of needs. Northwestern law students, working under
the direct supervision of clinical professors and attorneys, work
on cases as part of their coursework. The Children and Family Justice
Center has led local and national efforts to increase public knowledge
about justice matters for youth and has been instrumental in the
reform of Cook County Juvenile Court, the oldest and largest juvenile
court in the country.
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