News on Youth leadership & participation

31 July 2018
News
Me Me teaches adolescent girls in the camp about their health and human rights, and helps them understand their own potential. © UNFPA Myanmar
Finding a role model amid confinement of Myanmar’s Rohingya camps
RAKHINE, Myanmar – Harlee Dar, 14, does not go to school. There are no books, TV or radio in the family’s small shelter, which is sweltering in the summer and rain-beaten during monsoon season. Asked what she does when... Read more
24 July 2018
News
Girls attend a football programme run by UNFPA and the Special Olympics in Azerbaijan. The programme brings together girls living with disabilities and those without, to play sports and learn about their rights. © UNFPA Azerbaijan
Girls in Azerbaijan battle disability stigma with sports
ABSHERON, Azerbaijan – Fourteen-year-old Maryam stood, awe-struck, at the edge of an indoor football pitch in Absheron, Azerbaijan. “For me, seeing a real soccer pitch, a real goal net, and putting on a real soccer... Read more
23 July 2018
News
“Condoms will just disappear from our homes and we will know they are being used,” said 'Maneo Ramabanta, in Lesotho, where HIV prevention efforts must reach vulnerable adolescents. © UNFPA Lesotho/Violet Maraisane
HIV prevention efforts must reach most vulnerable – adolescents, young women, LGBTI communities
Netherlands/Lesotho/Botswana – The number of AIDS-related deaths has fallen to its lowest point this century thanks to improved access to antiretroviral treatment, according to a newly released report. Yet prevention... Read more
2 July 2018
News
As the monsoon season hits Cox's Bazar, refugees at Kutapalong refugee camp and elsewhere fear they are vulnerable to landslides. © UNHCR/Adam Dean
Health facilities, safe spaces reinforced as monsoon rains threaten Rohingya refugees
COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh – With monsoon rains unleashing floods and landslides in Bangladesh, UNFPA and partner agencies are urgently working to secure Rohingya refugee camps and settlements in Cox’s Bazar District.  “... Read more
26 June 2018
News
Martha Pobee, Ghana's Permanent Representative and Chair of the Committee for the United Nations Population Award, together with United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed and UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Natalia Kanem, who serves as the Award Committee's Secretary, at the 2018 UN Population Awards. © UNFPA/ Usenabasi Esiet
Sir Prince Ramsey, Guttmacher Institute and Save a Child’s Heart recognized with UN Population Award
UNITED NATIONS, New York – The United Nations honoured Dr. Sir Prince Ramsey, an Antiguan family doctor who played a pivotal role in advocating for HIV patients at the height of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, and who... Read more
21 June 2018
News
Young people from the Kakheti region of Georgia participate in peer education training on gender equality and reproductive health and rights. © UNFPA Georgia
Breaking taboos around sexual and reproductive health in rural Georgia
TBILISI, Georgia – Like many other girls from rural villages in Georgia, Elene* didn’t learn much about her sexual and reproductive health as an adolescent. Her mother told her about menstruation, but before Elene... Read more
30 May 2018
News
Faith Kiraison, an advocate for girls' rights and health, teaches her peers about menstrual health management. © UNFPA Kenya/Douglas Waudo
A turning point for girls' and women’s menstrual health in Africa
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa/NAROK, Kenya – “I felt embarrassed to be a girl and felt like it was a punishment,” recalled 13-year-old Faith, describing her first period.  She was living in a boarding school in Narok... Read more
10 May 2018
News
Drawing on her own experience being married as a child – and then getting back to school – Jenipher Sanni has become a mentor for girls in her community. © UN Foundation/GirlUp
A young activist in Malawi campaigns to keep girls out of marriage and in school
MANGOCHI, Malawi – Jenipher Sanni dreams of making it big in life, and this year, she prepares to sit for four exams to attain the certificate she needs to move on to university. But getting to this point has not been a... Read more
24 April 2018
News
Young women and men come to Safe Space sessions in equal numbers and with equal levels of interest in discussing topics that, otherwise, most don't talk about with anyone else. © UNFPA Maldives/Ashwa Faheem
Over coffee, young people in the Maldives discuss sexual and reproductive health
MALE’, MALDIVES – As the hammering, buzzing and whirring of construction drone on outside – the soundtrack of a growing capital city – young people gather at Male’s Jazz Café to talk relationships, sex and family... Read more
16 April 2018
News
Young actors perform a scene from "Ruža," an interactive play about the harms of child marriage. Photo by Almir Panjeta for UNICEF/UNFPA BiH
Drama helps battle child marriage in Bosnia and Herzegovina
SARAJEVO, Bosnia and Herzegovina – On the surface, child marriage seems to affect few girls in Bosnia and Herzegovina. But dig a little deeper, and a pattern emerges among the most marginalized, impoverished girls. A... Read more

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