Kieran O’Brien, Director of Partnerships for UNICEF Ireland, recently visited the Northern Province of Sri Lanka to monitor the progress of our work. Radika’s Story Radika is 60 years old, but she looks much older. When we meet first she smiles with her mouth, but not with her eyes. She has five grand-children, but … Continued

It takes more courage to talk than to fight, and it is encouraging to see that President Omar Hassan al Bashir and the First Vice-President, Salva Kiir Mayardit, have begun to do exactly that. Nils Kastberg is the UNICEF Representative in Sudan. In the past weeks, during developments in Abyei, Kadugli and in other parts … Continued

On a hospital bed in the besieged Libyan city of Misrata, five-year-old Malak Al-Shami flicks through pictures of her brother and sister on her father’s laptop. Three weeks ago the three children were asleep at home when a rocket smashed through the ceiling of their Libyan house. Report by Patrick Wells Malak lost her right … Continued

UNICEF Ireland Ambassador Rory McIlroy is currently in Haiti on his first ever field visit with UNICEF Ireland. Since becoming an Ambassador for the international children’s organisation, Rory has been very keen to make a field visit. This week Rory has had the chance to see for himself what the lives of children in Haiti … Continued

Around 30 young boys are hovering expectantly outside a community centre. They peer over each other’s shoulders to try to get a better look at the cardboard boxes filled with pictures. Report by Rebecca Fordham. Benghazi, 31 May 2011 “We are playing the ‘strange object game’,” says Diran Abdel Hafth, 15. “The idea is to … Continued

Violence has been raising in Tunisian camp. Their tents have been torched, their belongings looted and a temporary school for their children destroyed. Staying out in the open, amidst the charred remains of all they had left in the world, refugees in Tunisia’s Shousha camp are living in the shadow of fear and uncertainty. Report … Continued

At the Lake Muhazi Centre, an hour’s drive from the Rwandan capital, 30 adolescent boys have come together for a three-month course that offers counselling, education, recreational activities and vocational training. These are not your average young men – they used to be child soldiers in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo. Report by … Continued

UNICEF is improving transparency around vaccine supply by making vaccine prices available on its website. As the largest buyer of children’s vaccines, this move is in line with UNICEF’s commitment to ensure that vaccine supply is sustainable and affordable. UNICEF’s partners in immunisation welcome the positive development. Information on market dynamics that influence vaccine uptake … Continued

Ayman Ali, age 14, is lying on a stretcher bed in the medical tent of a boat arriving into Benghazi’s port from Misrata. Both his wrists are heavily bandaged and his eyes stare out ahead of him. Report by Rebecca Fordham. BENGHAZI, Libya (May 26, 2011). His cousin, 9-year-old Mamud Ali, lies on the bed … Continued

UNICEF provides shelter and sanitation to families and children displaced by conflict in Libya. Young boys are playing football in the yard and a group of girls are skipping to ring-a-roses in the far corner while their parents look on. A fourteen-year-old boy in a wheelchair is sitting in the shade talking to a group … Continued

The bullet hole is high on the whitewashed wall of what is, in other respects, a perfectly normal conference room, the kind you might find in a UNICEF office anywhere in the world. But to the staff of UNICEF’s Malakal office, the broken plaster – and its ricochet in the frame of a map on … Continued

Climate change seems to be blighting large parts of Africa. The effects are more pronounced than in the industrialized world, and people in developing nations are less able to deal with them. VIDEO: UNICEF correspondent Chris Niles reports on how climate change is altering the lives of traditional communities in Ethiopia and Kenya, and how … Continued