Beirut/Amsterdam - Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) is shocked by today's shelling of a primary school in the south of Lebanon. The shelling took place just before 10am, during school hours. Fifteen children were wounded, three of them seriously, when an artillery shell fell inside their school compound in the village of Arab Salim, Nabatiye region.

MSF works in Arab Salim and other villages bordering the Israeli-occupied area in south Lebanon. MSF appeals for the respect of the 1996 April Understanding, whose provisions ensure that under no circumstances civilians will be target of attack.

MSF runs a community-based mental health programme in several villages in southern Lebanon, including Arab Salim in the Nabatiye region, where the population in these frontline villages is suffering the effects of the violence of many years. Volunteer counsellors have been trained by MSF to provide psycho-social education for their communities and individual support and counselling. MSF has also trained and equipped first aid teams in several front-line areas. MSF has been present in the south of Lebanon since August 1998.