Syria's Missing Children
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What happened to the disappeared children of Syria?
I'm Ayesha Roscoe, and this is a Sunday Story from Up First, where we go beyond the news to bring you one big story. Over the winter, NPR's Dia Hadid was reporting in Syria. Rebel fighters had just overthrown the brutal dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad. In her weeks of reporting, Dia discovered something shocking. It wasn't just men and women who were imprisoned by the Assad regime. Children were also taken, and many remain unaccounted for. Today on The Sunday Story, what happened to the disappeared children of Syria? Dia Hadid brings us the story from her reporting in Damascus after the break. Stay with us.
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How did Dia Hadid investigate the missing children?
I'm Aisha Roscoe. This is a Sunday story from Up First. NPR's Dia Hadid joins me now to talk about her reporting from Damascus. Dia, I know you were sent to Syria in the chaotic weeks following the Assad regime's fall. How did you come across this story about missing children?
Aisha, as I was seeing what was happening in Damascus, I couldn't stop thinking about the children. I'd covered conflicts like this for so long and I knew there'd likely be a large number of kids in orphanages whose parents had been detained or even disappeared during the civil war. And I kept thinking, what was happening to them now? And let me tell you, this was hard for me. I have two young kids, so stories about vulnerable children really hit home. And I try not to take too many long trips away from them. So for this assignment, I felt like I needed their permission. So I told them, I'm going to Syria so I can meet little ones who don't have a mama who So is that okay to give your mama to some other kids for a little while? And my girls agreed.
That's very sweet of your girls.
So I began calling groups that care for vulnerable children, like UNICEF, the Red Cross, other big organizations that run programs in Syria. And one group I reached was SOS Children's Villages. That's an international aid group headquartered in Austria. It has branches all around the world, including in war zones. And a spokesperson for them told me they were coming to terms with a revelation that was shaking the organization. Their Damascus branch had secretly taken in children whose mothers had been detained by intelligence agents. And this revelation was triggering a lot of anger in Syrian society.
Well, I mean, and rightfully so. How did you investigate these allegations?
What challenges did Dia face while reporting in Syria?
Well, after getting this tip, me and producer Mirna Rashid, we went to other orphanages across Damascus and we asked, did intelligence agents force you to secretly take in children? And what happened to those children?
And what did you find out?
While it was really hard to get answers at first, orphanages did not want to speak to us. The situation felt so uncertain. The Assad regime had just fallen at the time and people online were accusing them of collaborating with the former regime. But as we investigated, we finally met an official at the Ministry of Social Affairs who also wanted to know the answers. You see, the ministry had been overtaken by rebels who formed an interim government, and Syrian families were asking them for help to find their children. So this official helped us by calling up orphanage directors and telling them that they had to talk to us. He requested anonymity through this process because he wasn't meant to be speaking to the media, let alone helping us.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What happened to the disappeared children of Syria?
0:00–1:39
2
How did Dia Hadid investigate the missing children?
1:39–3:43
3
What challenges did Dia face while reporting in Syria?
3:43–9:24
4
What did Sukaina Shbawi experience while detained?
9:24–19:47
5
How many children are missing due to the Syrian conflict?
19:47–22:37
6
What is the role of orphanages in Syria during the conflict?
22:37–26:19
7
Who is Hassan al-Abbasi and what is his story?
26:19–32:32
Speakers
7 identifiedMore from Up First from NPR
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