Tagged: Syria

A group of people pose for a photo in an airport

Safa’s pink bed: one refugee girl’s journey to Canada

Children in emergencies

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Story also available in: العربية
My story with Safa began in 2014 in Za’atari refugee camp. I had been working there since it opened in 2012. In those days, thousands of refugees arrived daily, often in desperate conditions as they fled on foot across the border. When I met Safa, she was six years old, learning in a UNICEF-supported school set up in a tent. She had… Read more →←
A man stands in front of a green wall

How a child refugee from Yarmouk plays a vital role during COVID-19

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How do you go from being a child refugee to the founder and CEO of one of Sweden’s biggest news agencies by the age of 29? It might sound surreal until you meet Kotada Yonus. This is his story about the power of will and entrepreneurship.   Kotada Yonus runs Aktarr, a news and media agency in Malmö, Sweden. Aktarr focuses on… Read more →←
Children sitting atop white cardboxes boxes.

Field notes from Rukban

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Story also available in: العربية 中文
This past week, the UN in Syria mobilized one of its largest humanitarian aid convoys to bring much needed lifesaving supplies to 40,000 people stranded at Rukban camp, in the arid desert on the south-eastern border between Syria and Jordan. We went with 118 supply trucks and more than 300 humanitarian workers from UNICEF, the UN and the… Read more →←
A boy sits on a school bench in a classroom with his face hidden behind a school text book that he is reading, in front of a faded green wall.

Seven

Children in emergencies

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Story also available in: Español Français 中文
Civil war Sieges Bombings Casualties Refugees I had heard these terms in history class, abstract concepts I hadn’t paid much attention to. Seven years ago, at the age of eleven, they became my reality. 2011 I was sitting in English class when the school’s supervisor suddenly interrupted the session. He told me I wouldn’t be… Read more →←
A boy with his back to the camera watches a boat filled with people as it comes ashore

The leap that started my future

Children in emergencies

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Story also available in: العربية Français
I have been living in the Netherlands for a little over two years now. Because I had to flee from Syria, I regularly get questions like: “How is the situation in Syria?”, “What do you think of the Netherlands?”, or “What are the differences between the two countries?” But every time I try to answer, more… Read more →←
A boy receiving a drop of vaccine on his tongue.

Polio and me: a Syrian doctor’s story

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Story also available in: Français 中文
I was seven months old when my mother took me to see a doctor in Suran, my hometown. I had a high fever, and she had noticed weakness in both my legs. It was then that I was diagnosed with polio. Polio is a highly contagious disease that attacks the nervous system. It can cause paralysis or even death among young children. While the… Read more →←
A man unloads UNICEF-branded box out of a covered truck.

Syrian families struggle to survive in besieged east Ghouta

Children in emergencies

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Story also available in: العربية
The scale of destruction and depth of suffering is mind-blowing. It is hard to imagine life in these conditions. These are the thoughts that hit me as we arrived in the so-called ‘buffer zone’ just outside of besieged Al-Nashabiyeh in east Ghouta, rural Damascus. Burnt trees, rubble, and damaged buildings lined the streets as we… Read more →←
A mom and two kids site on a couch.

Syrian diaries: A single mother’s journey of hope and fear

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Being a mother is miraculous. But for me, being forced live far away from my children just to put bread on the table, has turned this blessing into a curse. Being a Syrian mother in this time of war is my life challenge – a reason to fight, survive and win. This is what I tell myself every morning before I head off to work. I think of… Read more →←

A Syrian refugee is the first student in three generations

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Story also available in: العربية
Last week I was welcomed by Sidra’s family into their home in Erbil in the Kurdistan region of Iraq. Her family fled the conflict in Syria in late 2013. Sidra lives with her parents, grandparents, two uncles and their families, one aunt, and six siblings. The three-room house is unfinished, with unpainted walls, no locks and only one… Read more →←

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