They share a common language, a shared Christian heritage, and hundreds of years of history. But for more than 20 years, Ethiopians and Eritreans were separated by a bitter conflict and militarised frontier sealed as tightly as the Berlin wall or the Korean demilitarised zone. Now, Eritreans and Tigrayan Ethiopians are mingling again - in what has been hailed... Continue Reading →
How a shampoo bottle is saving young lives | THE ECONOMIST
How a shampoo bottle is saving young lives ON HIS first night as a trainee paediatrician in Sylhet, Bangladesh, Mohamad Chisti (pictured above) watched three children die of pneumonia. Oxygen was being delivered to them, through a face mask or via tubes placed near their nostrils, using what is called a basic “low-flow” technique which... Continue Reading →
Legal assault: Victims of rape in South Asia face further violation from the courts | THE ECONOMIST
WHEN a judge in the high court of the Indian state of Rajasthan recently acquitted a man of rape, he noted of the accuser, “Her hymen was ruptured and vagina admitted two fingers easily. The medical opinion is that the prosecutrix may be accustomed to sexual intercourse.” The implication was that only a virgin can... Continue Reading →
World Cup fever stokes bitter rivalries in Bangladesh, despite the fact it doesn’t have a team | THE TELEGRAPH
DESPITE the fact that its team has never qualified for the World Cup, football fans in Bangladesh are adopting other country's teams as their own, stoking bitter rivalries. Last week, rival supporters of Argentina’s Lionel Messi and Brazil’s Neymar fought with machetes in the town of Bandar. One man and his son were critically wounded... Continue Reading →
These Rohingya women escaped persecution. Now, they’re fighting for justice.
SINCE August, more than 680,000 Rohingya have fled Burma’s Rakhine state. To escape persecution, they crossed the border into Bangladesh, where they now occupy about 24 refugee camps near Cox’s Bazar. For years, the Rohingya, an ethnically distinct Muslim minority, have clashed with the majority Buddhist population in Burma, also known as Myanmar. The Burmese... Continue Reading →
How Bangladesh took on a global killer with the world’s only diarrhoeal disease hospital | THE TELEGRAPH
IN Dhaka, Bangladesh, two-month-old Sammiya flops lifelessly in her mother’s arms, her eyes glazed over. She is suffering from diarrhoea. This may not sound life-threatening – for most of us (in the West) diarrhoea is unpleasant, it might ruin a holiday or mean a few days off work at worst – but for many people across the... Continue Reading →
‘A lot of shame’: Rohingya camps brace for wave of babies conceived in rape | THE WASHINGTON POST
UKHIA, Bangladesh — For the thousands of Rohingya refugees who fled a violent crackdown in Burma, a new crisis looms: The babies conceived in rape are due soon. Doctors Without Borders has recorded 160 cases of pregnant rape victims between August 2017 and February 2018 in the vast refugee camps in Bangladesh. That number is expected to rise... Continue Reading →
Rohingya refugees at risk of monsoon misery | THE TELEGRAPH
AID agencies have warned that Rohingya Muslims living in Bangladesh's squalid refugee camps are facing yet more destruction and death due to an impending monsoon. Since August last year, 700,000 Rohingya have fled from Rakhine state in Myanmar, where, as a Muslim minority, they were persecuted by the Myanmar army and police. They have... Continue Reading →
A pasteurisation machine for breast milk | THE ECONOMIST
It will help Bangladeshi mothers who work in factories FOR the feeding of babies, everyone agrees that “breast is best”. It is not, however, always convenient. Textile workers in Bangladesh, who are mostly women, are entitled to four months’ maternity leave. Once this is over, they often end up parking their children with relatives when... Continue Reading →
Use it or lose it: EU plans to move closer to the Swedish model for parental leave | THE ECONOMIST
Even as Sweden has second thoughts about aspects of its ultra-generous system WHEN Johan Braven had his first child he took nine months of leave. For the second he took ten months, the same amount as his wife. “I was afraid of not having the bond if I didn’t spend time at home with the... Continue Reading →