Seven children were killed and five severely injured last week by unexploded bombs and IEDs in Northwest Syria.
In one of Syria's deadliest weeks since the fall of the Assad regime a total of 17 people were killed and 16 injured at the end of January, around half of them in former frontline battle areas. The true toll is feared to be much higher.
The deaths come at a time of heightened tensions in the country as the number of people on the move in search of safety rises sharply.
Children make up around one third of all explosive accident victims in Syria. They are most often killed or badly hurt after mistaking shiny metal objects on the ground for toys, when out scavenging scrap metal, or when tending to animals grazing on contaminated land.
The HALO Trust, the global demining charity, has operations in Idlib, Aleppo, Deir ez-Zor, Daara, Damascus and Homs, clearing rural areas of landmines and surveying explosive hazards in urban areas.
"Since December 2024, nearly 1,800 people have been killed or face life-changing injuries caused by lethal explosive remnants of war in Syria, including at least 108 child deaths. On average, that’s more than 130 civilian accidents every single month", says Simon Jackson, HALO Syria Programme Manager.
"We see heartbreaking incidents every day where an innocent step can change everything –children killed looking after animals, a mother and her two children wounded collecting scrap metal, or a farmer losing his entire flock", continues Jackson.
"In Palmyra, entire families are unable to return home because they can’t see where the silent dangers lie in wait for their children. That fear is keeping entire communities displaced long after the fighting has stopped."
HALO provides regular risk education classes alongside its clearance operations, but currently only has a team of 250 staff.
HALO needs €8M to sustain its work in Syria this year alone. "Unfortunately, due to the enormity of the problem, our work barely scratches the surface of the problem", Jackson adds.
Notes to editors
- Casualty figures are courtesy of the International NGO Safety Organisation (INSO).
- An estimated 1.25 million refugees and two million internally displaced people have already made the journey to their former homes across Syria.
- Syria is second only to Myanmar as the most dangerous country in the world for UXO accidents, according to the Landmine Monitor 2025.
- HALO Syria is supported by Irish Aid, UNOCHA – Syria Cross Border Humanitarian Fund, The German Federal Foreign Office, The Government of Norway, The Government of Canada, United Nations Development Programme and United Nations Mine Action Service.
