3/06/2005

Young Country


Children playing in al-Menshieh Park overlooking Shukri al-Quwatli Street. Syria has a very young population. About 46% of Syrians are under the age of 15 and nearly 60% are under 20.

10 comments:

x said...

interesting demographic. It's probably a combination of migrations, as well as average life span.

Anonymous said...

Just curious as to why you never seem to have any comments whenever a posting deals with Syria's government?

--------from an American that just wants to see someone in the Syria actually have the guts to openly criticize your own government

Anonymous said...

Dear american ,ask your government to stop supporting the middle eastern dictatorial regimes and after that we will be able to criticize these regimes.
The middle eastern people don't have any esteem in the American politics because this one only serves the Israeli interests and the dictatorial regimes.

Ayman Haykal said...

Desert Island Boy is right. Syria has the highest population growth rate in the Arab World and one of the highest in the whole world. Look at the following indices:

Population growth rate in Syria: 2.4% (compare to Lebanon 1.3, UAE 1.57, Egypt 1.83, Morocco 1.61, Greece 0.2 and US 0.92)

Birth rate 28.93/1000 population (compare to Lebanon 19.31, Egypt 23.84, UAE 18.65, Morocco 22.79, Greece 9.73, US 14.13)

Fertility rate 3.61 children born/woman (compare to Lebanon 1.95, Egypt 2.95, UAE 3.02, Morocco 2.81, Greece 1.32, US 2.07)

Infant mortality rate 30.6/1000 live births (compare to Lebanon 25.48, Egypt 33.9, UAE 15.06, Morocco 43.25, Greece 5.63, US 6.63)

Source www.indexmundi.com

Ayman Haykal said...

Dear American, I had to delete comments on previous political posts because they were filled with bad language rather than points of view. Freedom of expression is limited here, evrybody knows that, and this blog is not the place to test these limits by posting "anonymous" dirty language. In case you are curious to know, you can openly criticize the government here, not as freely as in the States, but also not less freely than in many other Arab countries.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for your reply, Ayman. It's a shame that the distrust that prevents any realistic peace is produced by ALL parties in the Middle East. Each government (US and yours) have economic and power agendas. Please don't make the assumption, as one writer did, that it's purely the fault of the Israelis and Americans for all the ills in the world. Nice blog, by the way!

-----the American

Anonymous said...

Dear American blogger! You are right that not everything that goes wrong in the world is the fault of your country or the Israelis - arguably your closest ally in the world, in fact the US is the biggest state sponsor & patron of Israel economically, politically, diplomatically and militarily! However you in turn must accept that your foreign policy is unfortunately biased and NOT even handed. There is a lot of pressure on Syria from the US and other members of the international community to implement UN resolution 1559 and withdraw its troops from Lebanon, this is fair enough. However we don't really see any kind of REAL pressure of ANY KIND exerted by the US and the international community on Israel to withdraw from the Gaza strip, West Bank, Jerusalem and the Golan Heights in violation of BOTH international law and decades old UN resolutions. I'm sorry if I sound cliched but to most Arabs and Muslims around the world that does seem to smack of double standards and hypocrisy. This is why a lot of Arab and Muslim youth become apathetic & get pushed towards extremism and terrorism when they see different rules and standards being applied to different countries - please note that I'm NOT condoning or justifying any kind of terrorism whether it is state terrorism or individual/group based terrorism! I am giving my opinion as to why I think terrorism has unfortunately become attractive to some young people in the Arab and Muslim world!
Howvever having said the above it should also be noted that the vast majority of Arabs and Muslims do admire the democratic and civil rights that are available in the US, UK, France etc. but which we are denied in our own countries. This is partly due to as you hint power and economic agendas of various countries but also the remnant of cold war geopolitics when western countries covertly supported pro-western authoritarian dictatorships in central and south america, africa, middle east, south asia and soth-east asia, because these autocrats were 'forces of stability' preventing any 'socialist/communist takeover' - I am sure that somebody of your insight probably knows this. Even though the cold war has long ended the US continues to support in 1 way or another various dictators (who hold sham and laughable elections or referenda i they hold them at all) such as Ben Ali in Tunisia, King Mohammad VI in Morocco, Mubarak in Egypt, King Fahd in Saudi Arabia and the other monarchial dictatorships in the gulf, King Abdullah II in Jordan, Islam Karimov in Uzbekistan, Emomali Rahmonov in Tajikistan, Nursultan Nazarbayrv in Kazakhstan, Askar Akayev in Kyrgystan etc. Sorry the list of Arab and Muslim countries with dictatorships went on and on but I did have to illustrate my point!
Most Arabs and Muslims like US and western culture: we watch Hollywood movies, Friends, Simpsons etc. drink Coke and Pepsi and eat McDonalds, fried chicken and wear like wearing denim jackets and jeans! Contrary to misconceptions we don't hate western culture or people but we do have significant differences on your governments' foreign policy!

Yaman said...

We must really ask ourselves how such old, decrepit thought has come to dominate such a youthful population...

Anonymous said...

well there is no place in this country at all to critisize I am afraid. Such a shame...That is why Syria will turn into Afganistan or North Corea with time..that is why everything is going downhill.

Anonymous said...

We will come
And we will fuck you
In your Arab ass
With a loaded M16

die now.