Three years of war have left Sudanese children in Egypt out of school, traumatised and exposed to gangs and drugs on the streets of Cairo.
Sudan's war has driven its youngest victims across the border, and in a neglected corner of Cairo, Sudanese children are now growing up amid rubbish, open sewage and nightly threats from drug dealers and street gangs. Three years of conflict have left hundreds of thousands of them out of school and dangerously exposed.
For Tala*, a social worker in the neighbourhood, each day is a fight to pull deeply traumatised young refugees back from the edge. The scars of war follow these kids everywhere: the loss of homes, the loss of family and the loss of any sense of safety or routine.
One case captures how deep the pain runs. An eight-year-old boy repeatedly told his mother he wanted to die so he could be with his father, who was killed in Sudan before the family escaped to Egypt. Stories like his show how much support children need, and how little of it is reaching them.
Without schooling, stable shelter or mental health care, many young Sudanese in Cairo are being left to fend for themselves in an environment where violence and exploitation are close at hand. Aid workers warn that this is a generation at a breaking point, and that the cost of ignoring them will be measured in lives and futures across the region.
*Name changed to protect identity.
