Syria: Nervous Children Return To School

By Sky Arthy, Sky News Producer, in Damascus

Five million pupils were due back in school today in Syria at the start of the new year.

It is a scene that is played out across the world and it looks no different in Damascus.

Excited five-year-olds with new backpacks clutching their parents' hands not knowing what to expect on their first day.

Teenage girls wearing the latest fashions walking arm in arm catching up on gossip after the long summer break. Young boys playing football before the bell goes for the start of classes.

The Assad regime watches over Syria's returning pupils

But it is different here.

Before  the conflict that has left 100,000 people dead, many children used to walk to school. Now most are dropped off by their parents. 

In a city where fighting is raging in the outer suburbs and the boom of shelling is heard in the background it is not hard to fathom why.

More than 2,000 of Syria's 22,000 schools have been destroyed in the war, according to the government. Unicef puts the figure at nearer 3,000.

One father, who lives six miles (10km) from Damascus said he had taught his children at home for a year because their school had been shelled.

This morning he arrived at the Dar es Salaam school in the centre of the capital with his two daughters. 

"This is the first time they have come to this school," he said.

"There is new hope now (following the deal in Geneva) ... American military strikes are not the solution. Dialogue is the only way."

Another father, who has been trying to emigrate to France, said: "There is some hope now. Last year the situation was bad. Now there is progress."

At least most children in Damascus still have the chance to go to school.

For the one million Syrian youngsters that are now refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq and Egypt their education is far more precarious.

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