This was despite the absence of fighting in Kabul between September 1996 and June 1997, when the interviews took place. Almost all said that they felt fear, more than anger or sadness. Significantly, in a country where hardline Mullahs have banned girls and women from schools, colleges and the workplace, more than half the children interviewed still wanted to be a doctor or a teacher. Asked what they wished for most, nearly two-thirds said they wanted peace or to finish school or to get an education in the future. Afghanistan today is a country of widows and in many families, women became the main earners.
Children are less likely to survive because their bodies are so vulnerable.
Helping children out of their trauma is a long and involved process. Mostly, children try to suppress horrific and disturbing memories by suppressing, rather than confronting them. Trauma researchers generally believe that the repression of memories is at the heart of trauma suffering. The suffering child has to be helped to express suffering and to confront memories, with the support and guidance of an empathetic and informed adult, the report said. The study noted that many of the children in Kabul display avoidance behaviour around scarring events - they said they try not to think or talk about about the events.