This is the News in Brief from the United Nations
More than half of world’s refugee children ‘do not get an education’, warns UNHCR
Millions of refugee children are missing out on an education, the UN said on Friday, in an appeal to host countries to prevent them from “languishing” in camps for years where they lose hope.
According to a UN refugee agency (UNHCR) report, out of 7.1 million refugee youngsters of school age, more than half don’t attend lessons.
The problem gets worse as they get older, with six in 10 refugee children attending primary school and only two in 10 benefiting from secondary education.
Here’s UNHCR’s Melissa Fleming, speaking in Geneva:
“Not investing in refugees, people who have fled war zones…is not investing very simply in the future of its people; the people have to be the future: teachers, architects, the peacemakers, artists, politicians who are interested in reconciliation and not revenge. So it is short-sighted and it is, frankly, dumb.”
Highlighting the refugee education crisis in Greece, Ms. Fleming warned that there are still “thousands and thousands of asylum seekers, many of them children” who were receiving no schooling.
To counter a lack of funding, UNHCR is appealing to Governments to allow more refugees to be included in national education systems, instead of being “corralled” into unofficial learning centres.
WHO confirms new Ebola case in Uganda
As the number of Ebola virus epidemic infections continues to climb in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), a new case of the disease has been identified in neighbouring Uganda, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday.
In June, two people died from Ebola in Uganda after they had crossed the border from eastern DRC. A third individual from the same family died after he was sent back to DRC.
Speaking in Geneva, WHO spokesperson Fadela Chaib confirmed that the individual, a child, had been stopped in a routine border check at Mpondwe in western Uganda, reportedly on Wednesday.
“This girl is aged nine years old…she’s a Congolese girl, so she’s from DRC. She was tested positive for Ebola in Uganda and she came to seek help from DRC to seek medical care on a motorbike….We don’t know if she’s still alive or not. I don’t have the details of the treatment, what I know is, when she turned up at the border, she was showing all of the symptoms of an Ebola case; she was bleeding from the mouth, a rash, very sick, fever.”
The development comes ahead of a visit by UN Secretary-General António Guterres to DRC to show solidarity with victims and healthworkers. To date, the disease has claimed about 2,000 lives, while nearly 900 have survived.
Guterres hails Timor-Leste on the 20th anniversary of 1999 ‘independence’ poll
And staying with the UN Secretary-General, 20 years since a people’s vote “put Timor-Leste “firmly on the path of independence”, Mr. Guterres has extended his congratulations to the country for its “tremendous achievements” since then.
In a statement issued by his Office to coincide with the anniversary of the 1999 poll, the Secretary-General hailed the fact that it had held four peaceful elections, built new institutions, grown the economy and laid the “foundations for reconciliation, democracy and stability”.
Timor-Leste’s independence from Indonesia was recognized in 2002 and overseen by UN peacekeepers, to prevent further bloodshed amid clashes between opponents of the popular vote.
Daniel Johnson, UN News
