A heartwrenching court case in France poses thorny questions as the very meaning of family evolves more quickly than the legal system, or even the experts, can keep up with.
Tag: children
SARAQEB — Zaytoun and Zaytouna relies on games, stories and illustrations to make life in Syria’s war zone a bit more bearable for kids. Launched in July 2013, the four-page magazine started as a modest project with a team of three people using a small printer and circulating it to a limited number of children. Today, says magazine director Sumar Kanjo, the team includes over 10 writers and 10 illustrators, and Zaytoun and Zaytouna has become a cultural pillar in Saraqeb and other areas under opposition control. In addition to the paper edition, the magazine is launching a website and […]
China has proposed making revisions to the country’s policy of punishing couples who have more than one child. But instead, such population controls should be abolished entirely.
NEW DELHI — Archana, who is just 15, is desperately trying to put her 3-month-old brother to sleep. He’s crying out for his mother, who died last week after going to a government-run sterilization camp. At least 15 others suffered the same fate, and scores of others are seriously ill after undergoing tubectomies at two Indian sterilization “camps.” Ongoing investigations point to contaminated drugs given to the women as a possible cause of death. But a dirty operating room and surgeries performed in a matter of minutes with unsanitized instruments have raised serious questions about India’s approach to population control […]
A Turkish immigrant playwright in Germany explores the meaning and theater of a religious rite that divides modern society.
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Back To School
I had only been retired for three years when we visited this school in eastern Nepal. As far as teaching goes, this felt very far indeed from my career as a high school philosophy teacher in France.
TEL AVIV — With Israeli students returning to school this week, Calcalist decided to ask a few how they spent what turned out to be an unusual summer holiday, given the fighting between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Seven weeks of Israeli airstrikes in Gaza and Hamas rocket attacks aimed at targets in Israel have […]
ROME — These are the kinds of lives that appear like ships at the mercy of a storm, where salvation will seem like a surprise — if it actually arrives. These are the stories of Eritreans with Italian roots trying, sometimes with the most desperate means, to make it to Italy. First, the history. Italy […]
After students were hospitalized in the Bordeaux winegrowing region, pesticides were blamed. Parents calling for new rules near schools face a “code of silence” protecting the wine sector.
Argentina is the patriarchal latecomer after moves by several Latin Americans to adopt norms to outlaw any physical violence inflicted on children.
BERLIN — Peter Seher sits on his balcony in Berlin-Wilmersdorf enjoying the late afternoon sun. He looks at the large puddles of water beneath his feet. It was nice and warm today, so after work the stockbroker set up a little wading pool on the balcony for his young daughter Hanna. “She really got going […]
It seemed like a good idea to a German restaurateur: attract more family clientele who wouldn’t disturb other patrons. But putting an idea into action can be a messy affair.
Many Syrian children are forced to leave school and work as child laborers for employers who ofter mistreat them. New statistics shows a 30% drop in school attendance since the war began.
KARACHI — It’s time for the evening prayer at the Edhi Shelter Home in Karachi, Pakistan. For nine-year-old Rehmatullah Khan, it’s a reminder of a painful childhood past. His parents sent him to an Islamic boarding school in the northwestern city of Quetta when he was just three. “At seminary, my teacher would beat me and the other students,” he recalls. “The teacher would beat us for not memorizing the lessons or making a noise. He sometimes hit us with sticks and would punch me when the other students told him it was me making noise in the classroom.” After […]
In the often tough multi-ethnic neighborhoods on the periphery of French cities, the Catholic youth organizations offer a way out.
CAIRO — A student in a pre-kindergarten classroom at one of Cairo’s suburban schools is anticipating her impending birthday. When asked how old she will be, the girl begins to count up to four on her fingers, but then looks at her hand in dismay and quickly puts it down. Only “bad people” make that […]
As part of a collaboration between Syria Deeply and Rookie, we’re publishing the memoirs of a teenage girl living in the midst of Syria’s war. Marah, as she’s chosen to be known, lives in a city under siege. She was 15 years old when the uprising began. This is the first in her series of articles. My city was once magnificent. In spring, it bloomed. We used to wake up to the sound of birds chirping and to the fragrant scent of flowers. Today, spring is here again. But what kind of spring is this? We now wake up to […]
KAPOOSAR — Pancho Mai is a villager in Kapoosar, located in the Tharpakar district. Today is the festival of Holi, but the 25-year-old mother is deep in mourning. Over the past three months, her three children have died. “They had fever for a few days, and then pneumonia killed each one of them,” she says numbly. Her mother-in-law, Kaplana Mai, had rushed the children to the only government hospital in the district. But it was too late. They died within days. This is not an isolated case. According to independent statistics reported by the local media, some 200 children, mostly […]
ISTANBUL — “I was 13,” said Nezihe. “He had been following me on my way to school and back. One day, he forced me into his car while I was leaving school and kidnapped me. He was somebody I had never seen before. They had made a deal with my family that very evening. A […]
-Opinion- BEIJING — After trying it out for less than two months, China’s southeast city of Guangzhou has announced it will suspend the “safe baby hatch” program, which provided a secure place to leave abandoned babies to increase their chance for survival. Since Guangzhou’s Children’s Social Welfare Home launched the arrangement earlier this year, 262 […]
PALERMO — Italy was in shock again this week after a 2-year-old boy was killed in a revenge hit by the Sacra Corona Unita (SCU) organized crime syndicate on a Puglia motorway Monday night. The little boy, Domenico Petruzzelli, was one of three people, along with his mother and her partner — a convicted murderer […]
An orphanage in this southeastern city received more abandoned babies in a pilot “safe haven” program than anywhere else in the country.
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The Llama Guarantee
There are llamas and alpacas everywhere in Peru. Contrary to what people may think, they are very docile creatures and their infamous bouts of spitting are apparently quite rare. More to the point, both animals produce high-quality wool, which I can attest to: The bedspread I bought in Peru on this trip is still as […]
When she died of a brain tumor at the age of three, Naomi*’s parents, who were by her side until the end, decided to tell their story amidst a growing push to extend assisted death to children.
LAUSANNE — The idea that young people nowadays are more conservative than previous generations is a common cliché. Girls are said to be dreaming of becoming housewives while boys supposedly behave like old-style alpha-males, reproductive and career-obsessed. As Switzerland is about to vote on an initiative that aims to use tax breaks to benefit a […]
FLORENCE — “This taxi is a revolution of love: I’m rediscovering life thanks to death …” Caterina Bellandi’s words are nearly as colorful as her coat. For the past 12 years, this exuberant Florentine taxi driver has turned off the meter to give joy rides around Florence to child cancer patients, or simply accompany them […]
The Brazilian indigenous Guarani nation has had their land taken away and way of life threatened – now a new study shows the suicide rate is 34 times higher than the national average.
LIMETE — Three times a week here, in this municipality within the Kinshasa province of Congo, street children gather in the square to practice Brazilian capoeira, a martial art that incorporates dance, music and acrobatics. For the past seven years, these unlikely enthusiasts of the disclipline have occupied a portion of an abandoned basketball court. […]
The most populous country in the world has no clear method for reporting or responding to abuse of its most vulnerable. Child welfare organizations fight to make a change.
SAUDI GAZETTE, BBC, LE MONDE (France) Worldcrunch RIYADH – For the first time in Saudi Arabia, a new law has been passed that prohibits all forms of physical and sexual abuse, a measure hailed by human rights groups as a breakthrough in protecting women and children. Sources at the Ministry of Social Affairs told the […]
TEL AVIV — The school year is starting soon, and with it comes another not-so-small burden on families around Israel: pre-school and pre-elementary education can cost up to one-third of a person’s gross salary, even in upper-income cities and towns. Indeed, child care expenses for young families was a central point of contention during the […]
The eldest daughter of the disgraced prime minister controls the family businesses with an iron fist. The question is whether she’ll decide to bring the same passion to politics.
BYDGOSZCZ – Five-year-old Dobrusia has been in the Pediatric Oncology Division at Jurasz Hospital in this northern Polish city for a week now. “We are still waiting for the diagnosis, so we are not sure what to expect,” says her mother. As she and her family anxiously anticipate her exam results, Dobrusia spends much of […]
BURZACO – Carrot leaves are poking through the soil, the lettuces are green and leafy, and the spring onions are standing tall: these vegetables are being nurured at secondary school No. 56 in Burzaco, 25 kilometers south of Buenos Aires. And as the vegetables have put down roots, classroom violence has been on a sharp […]
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At Least 38 Dead In Italy Bus Crash
BBC NEWS (UK) Worldcrunch AVELLINO – A bus has plunged off a viaduct in southern Italy on Sunday night, leaving at least 38 people dead, rescue services say. The bus hit several vehicles before smashing through a parapet and toppling down a steep slope near the town of Avellino, in the Campania region. At least […]
It’s her eyes that are so arresting. Big brown eyes looking at the camera. Nada Al-Ahdal holds that serious, penetrating, almost unwavering look the whole time – just under three minutes – she addresses viewers. Nada is 11 years old. If her parents had had their way, she would be married by now — married […]
Whole families are forced to leave Rwanda’s struggling north. Boys look for work at an early age; the girls, instead, all too often are pushed to get married across the border in Uganda.
Forty years after government killings here sparked the militant anti-Apartheid movement, the ailing grandfather of modern South Africa is a reminder not to return to the past.
GENEVA – Wife: “I’ve done my share. It’s your turn now.” Husband: “If you leave me in the next five years, I’ll really feel like I sacrificed myself for nothing.” What are they talking about? Working part-time to spend more time with the kids? Turning down a promotion? Giving up paragliding and cycling on weekends […]
Since the 2008 melamine-tainted milk scandal, little has changed in the Chinese dairy industry. Interest groups and nationalism are to blame.