The impact of conflict on children in particular is now a constant feature of news from around the world. The children featured may be from many different ethnic, religious or national identities, and the combatants in the conflict differ from place to place, but one thing is always true: whoever is responsible for the violence…
The people of South East Asia are among the most friendly, tolerant and hard working people in the world. Yet, this region has been plagued with conflicts for decades. Exploited by European powers, occupied by Japan, carpet-bombed by the USA and led by hideous dictators, most of the region has suffered too much…
Today is a big day in a big year. In 2015 the UN will celebrate the significant if incomplete success of the Millennium Development Goals and agree a new set of goals – the Sustainable Development Goals – as the engine for development over the next fifteen years. And today action2015 has been launched around the world to mobilise groups…
If the TV show Pointless asked contestants to name countries with UN peacekeeping missions then the Central African Republic would almost certainly be a ‘pointless’ answer: one that no-one was able to guess. Yet, in this country with a population smaller than Scotland (4.6 million) thousands were murdered, raped and mutilated at the end of…
In October 2009, deep in the jungle in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, I visited a small village where 40 brave UN Peacekeepers from India were ‘protecting’ the villagers from the armed groups who were killing and looting across the region, and from their National Army who were, then, probably as guilty as the groups.…
