GENEVA (AA) – The Spanish church has asked for forgiveness from victims of sexual abuse, confessing its “great sin” which affects “one in five children in Europe,” according to local media. The apology came during the inaugural address of the Plenary Assembly of the Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE), which is bei...
Rabat, Morocco (AFP): Three defendants accused of repeatedly raping a Moroccan girl pleaded not guilty Thursday as the case went to appeal, after their light sentences shocked the country. The victim was only 11 when she was “repeatedly raped” and became pregnant, according to rights groups in the North African kingdom. The legal t...
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AA) — One in every four children in Bangladesh under the age of five was found to be stunted, due mainly to poor diet and malnutrition, according to the results of a national health survey. Poverty, child marriage, and lack of access to nutritious foods are among the major causes behind the poor […]
Casablanca, Morocco (AFP): The lawyer for an 11-year-old Moroccan girl whose rapists received light sentences on Wednesday urged authorities to review laws protecting minors. Mohamed Sebbar made the appeal at a news conference on the eve of an appeal hearing by the victim after a court sentenced one of the girl’s three attackers to two [...
ANKARA (AA) – Indian health authorities have canceled the license of a pharmaceutical firm that manufactured cough syrup linked to the deaths of at least 19 children in Uzbekistan last year. The action comes just days after three employees of Marion Biotech, located in Noida in northern Uttar Pradesh state, were arrested by police after [&hell...
GENEVA (AA) – The denial of girls’ education in Afghanistan is “manifestly discriminatory,” said a UN rights official on Tuesday, urging the interim Taliban government to open schools to girls at all levels. “The denial of a secondary school education and of access to university is manifestly discriminatory, profo...
DOUALA, Cameroon (AA) – Ten million children living in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, twice as many as in 2020 due to intensifying conflicts, UNICEF warned Friday. “Armed conflict is increasingly affecting children, who are victims of intensified military clashes or targeted by non-state...
GAZIANTEP, Türkiye (AA) – A volunteer graffiti artist at a tent city in Türkiye’s quake-hit Gaziantep province is healing the trauma of children through art. Senol Karakaya spends time daily with about 50 children at the tent city in Islahiye after the February 6 earthquakes in Türkiye. “We’ve come for a volunteer effor...
Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (AFP): Cradling a pink stuffed animal as she sleeps in a United Arab Emirates hospital, a nine-year-old Syrian earthquake survivor is recovering from the wounds that nearly claimed her life, believing her mother is still alive. Sham Sheikh Mohammed, who suffered severe crush injuries in a 40-hour ordeal under th...
Maaret Masrin, Syria (AFP): Syrian medics have launched the first cholera vaccination campaign in the rebel-held northwest since a deadly outbreak began last year, amid increased fears of contagion after last month’s devastating earthquake. Health workers are going door to door to inoculate people in homes and displacement camps in the I...
