 |
Welcome to the Homepage of |
|
||||||||
| MARA is a project being implemented by AAS (AIDS Awareness Society) in Lahore, Pakistan in partnership with Plan International Pakistan. Rational: Homeless/runaway/street adolescents and youth throughout the world share histories of rejection and betrayal by families and society whether it be for reasons of poverty or family and parental difficulties. They are considered, Most at risk adolescents (MARA) and Especially Vulnerable Adolescents (EVA) between the ages of 10 to 19 years and youth 20 to 25 years. They leave their families in search of improved material, physical and emotional conditions, but they are met on the streets by a world of further rejection, violence, rape, sodomy, prostitution, drug abuse mental and emotional disturbance economic marginality and hunger. Stigmatized, alienated and exploited, the risks children face of violence, drug abuse and HIV dramatically increase when they come to the street. In Lahore as much as 25000 children were found to be doing street based work as hawkers, garbage pickers, beggars and commercial sex workers. |
|||||||||
