The inclusion of women’s voices and the protection of their rights should be a key component of the Afghanistan peace negotiations.

UnionAID, International Alert Philippines, the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and Victoria University of Wellington invite emerging community leaders from all regions of Mindanao to apply for the 2019 Mindanao Young Leaders Programme, commencing in August 2019 in Wellington, New Zealand.

International Alert is pleased to announce the appointment of Jessica Banfield as its new Director of Programmes. She will join Alert from April 2019.

“I try to explain to the parishioners that an imam is not a person who only reads Namāz five times a day in the mosque and then goes home,” says Nematulla, the imam of Jalal-Abad province in Kyrgyzstan. That is why Nematulla is one of the 1,426 imams taking part in our project, ‘Constructive dialogues on religion and democracy’.

The Nobel Prize committee's focus on efforts to end the use of sexual and gender based violence (SGBV) as a weapon of war is highly significant and timely. But it is also important to highlight that SGBV, sexual exploitation and abuse does not only occur in conflict, nor does it end when conflict ceases.

Patriarchal social norms, poverty and alcohol abuse are all to blame for the violence against women and girls in Tajikistan. So efforts to prevent such violence needs to tackle all those issues.

By fostering financial independence and giving families the tools to resolve their conflicts through discussion and understanding, we help Tajik women at risk of gender-based violence to be seen as valued members of society and be able to contribute to the family economically.

21-year-old Dooma not only lost a child, but had to abandon another in order to escape Boko Haram captivity and be free.

The only thing keeping Abdul alive is hope. Hope that one day his daughters will return home from Boko Haram captivity.