The world must make faster progress to end female genital mutilation by 2030

It irreparably damages girls’ bodies, inflicting excruciating pain. It causes extreme emotional trauma that can last a lifetime.

(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis on Wednesday during his General Audience highlighted that on November 20th Universal Children's Day will be observed.

Among the surging number of migrants headed to Europe are pregnant women who are giving birth — whether it’s in Libya as they wait to cross the sea, on rescue ships or at Budapest’s Keleti train station.

A Nigerian migrant mother called her baby girl “Gift” after a difficult delivery on an Italian navy ship that rescued her in the Mediterranean.

• Resolution recognises child, early and forced marriage as a violation of human rights and calls for strengthened efforts to prevent and eliminate this harmful practice and support married girls
• Over 85 countries co-sponsored the resolution, including countries with high rates of child marriage
• Important call to action as States prepare to adopt and implement the Sustainable Development Goals and target 5.3 on child marriage

Several dozen of the world's most prominent scientists sprang from their seats and left the Vatican hall where they were holding a conference on the environment in May 2014. They were bound for a meet-and-greet with Pope Francis at the modest Vatican hotel where he lives, the Domus Sanctae Marthae.

Josh Levs, CNN
Updated 11:55 AM ET, Mon April 13, 2015

Malala Yousafzai, reading her open letter to kidnapped Nigerian schoolgirls to mark the anniversary of their abudction.
(CNN)On the eve of the one-year mark since nearly 300 schoolgirls were abducted by Boko Haram in Nigeria, Malala Yousafzai released an "open letter" to the girls Monday.

"Like you, I was a target of militants who did not want girls to go to school," she writes in the letter. The 17-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner survived an attack by the Taliban, which had singled her out for blogging from Pakistan about the importance of staying in school.

Unicef report finds number of children entering poverty during global recession is 2.6 million greater than number lifted out of it.

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Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation

When Ebola emerged in West Africa this year, the virus was able to spread so quickly partly because burial rituals in Guinea and Sierra Leone involve washing the dead - and it's been hard to dissuade people from touching infected corpses.

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BENTIU— Women and children in South Sudan have been the victims of horrific sexual violence since the country plunged into conflict 10 months ago, the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy on Sexual Violence in Conflict, Zainab Bangura, said after a week-long visit.