AMHARA REGION, Ethiopia – Hayria, 11, remembers the day her village was attacked. “When I first heard gunshots, I didn’t think it was anything serious. But the sounds kept getting closer,” she says.
Concerned for their safety, the family fled their home in Dangur woreda, a district in the Benishangul-Gumuz region in northwest Ethiopia, and spent the night at Hayria’s grandmother’s house.
The gunfire continued through the night. “I was terrified. I couldn’t stop crying,” Hayria says.
The family decided to travel to the neighbouring Amhara region, eventually arriving in Chagni, which is currently home to around 49,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs), according to the Amhara regional government.
“I’m not sure where my friends are. I don’t know what happened to them,” says Hayria, who is now one of around 20,000 children displaced by violence in Benishangul-Gumuz since November 2020.
Like many other students, she was excited about the upcoming academic year. “My mother had already bought me exercise books,” she says. “I really wanted to learn. I miss my school and my friends.”
Hayria says she wants to become a doctor one day so she can help treat sick people. But it’s unclear when she’ll be able to return to her school – or even her home. For now, she and her sister are doing what they can to help their mother, including fetching water from one of the water points installed by UNICEF.
Ethiopia. Two people sit on top of a water tank at a displacement site.
UNICEF/UN0418429/Ayene
UNICEF, in coordination with the Amhara regional government, is providing clean water for those staying in a camp for internally displaced persons.
With funding from USAID, UNICEF was able to install five 10,000-litre tanks to store safe water for those staying at the displacement site.
Ethiopia. Children gather to collect clean water from a water point.
UNICEF/UN0418428/Ayene
Children gather to collect clean water from a water point.
Clean water is trucked in regularly, and UNICEF is coordinating with the Amhara regional government to supply therapeutic foods, medicines and other supplies, says Israel Alemayehu, a nutrition officer at UNICEF’s Amhara field office.
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