UNICEF helps feed, educate children in southern Sudan

By Scott Herron CNN World Report

A UNICEF aid program benefits the children of southern Sudan

War is often described as hell on earth.

And it's especially hellish on children.

Two CNN World Report contributors recently focused on the effects of war on children in Africa -- in Sudan and Mozambique.

United Nations Television told how the United Nations Children's Fund is helping feed and educate some of the tens of thousands of children in southern Sudan who have been displaced by 30 years of civil war. UNICEF has helped more than 100,000 women and children, and UNTV reports that malnutrition rates have been reduced significantly.

Many of the children are orphaned, but even those who still have one or both parents may essentially be on their own.

Romano Mayom, a school teacher who helps match orphaned children with missing family members, explained: "Some children may have relatives somewhere. A mother may be around. But the mother is sick and can't do anything."

Horrors of war still haunt thousands of children in Mozambique

Former child soldiers in Mozambique receive psychological counseling

The problem in Mozambique is not just the lack of adequate food and education but the damaging psychological effects that war can have on children, especially those who fought themselves.

The South African Broadcasting Corporation reported that an estimated 10,000 children were used as soldiers in Mozambique, and for many of them the emotional scars from watching or performing atrocities will never leave them.

A report by Robyn Curnow looked at efforts to rehabilitate about 150 of these children, making use of traditional healers and ancestral connections to help the children regain self esteem.

Special attention is placed on former female child soldiers.

Psychologist Boia Efraime Jr. said, "They are kidnapped, sexually exploited, exploited as slaves ... and coming back to the families, the families don't want to hear about what happened during the war because they think they failed to fulfill their role as protectors. And so they create a taboo and don't want to speak about that."

Curnow reported that such "stories of lost innocence, lost lives and lost opportunities can be heard across Mozambique."

Philippine street children struggle to survive

Many children in the Philippines, and their families, are simply trying to survive the mean streets of greater Manila.

A homeless mother and child beg on the streets of a Manila suburb

Jay Taruc, a reporter for GMA-7 News, focused in a recent contribution to CNN World Report on several homeless families who live on a small bridge in Quezon City, a Manila suburb and the Philippines' former capital.

He spoke to Bert -- homeless, jobless and the father of three -- who described how his family copes with abject poverty.

"My wife takes one of my kids to the streets to beg," Bert explained. "She earns more than I do through begging. That's why my wife shoulders most of our expenses."

Taruc reports that Bert's wife, Linda, brings home to her family's bridge about 160 pesos a day, or about $4-$5. That's enough to buy food for the family for a day.

For beggars such as Linda, young children -- even babies -- are often key to their survival.

Taruc explained: "Babies are often used by beggars because, according to them, babies easily earn the sympathy of would-be givers, therefore making begging easier."

Citing government sources, Taruc reported that some homeless families even rent their babies to childless beggars, and that in some cases babies are sold to beggar syndicates.

CCTV focuses on ethnic Miao minority

China Central Television has recently taken an in-depth look at ethnic minority groups in China's southeastern Guizhou Province, including the Miao people, one of the oldest civilizations in the world. The Miao were once concentrated in the Yellow River valley, but are now mostly found in the mountains of Guizhou.

China's ethnic Miao people struggle to maintain their traditions as one of the world's oldest living cultures

In a series of dispatches from the rural region that is home to many aboriginal peoples, roving reporter Han Bin examined the region's historic culture, economic place in modern China and traditional practices.

Han is a regular contributor to both the daily and weekend versions of CNN World Report and often reports on minority, cultural and artistic issues in China.

Han and his camera crew visited a traditional Miao Saturday market that in some ways hasn't changed for several thousand years.

But, he said: "The outside world has increasingly intruded into their lifestyles ... and as a result, changes have taken place in the once-isolated lives of the Miao people."

Among them are the ways the Miao people work and dress.

A Chinese artist, Tang Chunfang, told Han that preserving minority cultures is crucial to the nation's future. Tang said that a better understanding and respect of ethnic cultures will improve mutual understanding among different minorities, and in effect strengthen the unity of the whole nation.

Vienna-based radio station broadcasts Balkan news

Austrian television station ORF recently provided a report on a new, multi-lingual radio program based in Vienna that broadcasts across Europe and is aimed especially to listeners in the conflict area of the Balkans.

The program, Radio Neighbor in Need, is on the air from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m., Central European time, and can be heard in the Albanian, Serbian, English and German languages. The Austrian Broadcasting Corporation pays for the program in an effort to provide news and information to victims of the war.

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