Families get to experience life on the run in refugee exercise

Children came face to face with the hardships of life as a refugee in a family activity programme at the Museum of Coastal Defence yesterday.

They and their parents were forced to flee an imaginary war zone with only five personal possessions each and trek through a hostile environment to a refugee camp in an exercise that was organised by the Red Cross.

The 19-strong group was led by Red Cross stewards up the steep slopes of the museum site in steamy weather to set up camp in the ruins of a former Royal Artillery barracks only to find it had been commandeered by 'enemy soldiers'.

The soldiers ordered each family to give up two of their possessions and show their documents before forcing them to resume their uphill march until they reached the last of three proposed campsites.

Once at the camp, some refugees were responsible for making sanitary arrangements and distributing the scant supplies - one packet of biscuits and three bottles of water - while others had to wait for ID checks.

Senior staff officer Sze-To Kin-tat said the exercise aimed to raise children's awareness of refugees by presenting them with practical problems to think about while fleeing the mock war zone.