Anyone thinking that the United Nations is an upright, honest and honorable organization that can be trusted across the board probably should have been paying a bit more attention when the oil-for-food scandal broke a couple of years back.

If the corruption involved in that mess didn't get people taking a second look toward that big building on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, perhaps this confession of years of fabrication and dispensing of false information on the global... more

Thursday of last week, the 18th of October, saw the first European Union Anti-Trafficking Day. There seems to have been very little prep for this 'event' ... the press release coming out only three days before ... and it looks like much of the to do was centered around a Kevin Kline movie called "Trade" and "an experts meeting will be held in Brussels".

Whatever... more

Continued from the previous post where we were looking at some faulty thinking ...

Can we point out how downright silly many of UNICEF's arguments against international adoption are? The hierarchal system insisted upon, for example, that can so quickly be checked and discounted: bio parents, then other nationals, then foreigners living in country, then as a last, last resort, parents in gasp! a whole other country.

Biological parents... more

Continued from the previous post where we were starting to look at a UNICEF contribution called "State of the World's Children 2007".

The "Women and Children: The Double Dividend of Gender Equality" title does have a lovely ring to it, but it's hollow, folks.

UNICEF director Ann Veneman says in a press release, “If we care about the health and well-being of children today and into the... more

UNICEF released figures last week showing that fewer of the world's children under the age of five-years died last year than usual ... less than 10 million of them ... a turn of events the organization is calling "solid progress on child survival".

"This is an historic moment," said UNICEF executive director Ann Veneman. "More children are surviving today than ever before. Now we must build on this public health success to push for the achievement of the Millennium... more

I am so hoping I wasn't in the minority of news watchers coming close to ralfing my waffles over the brand-new,shiny and spiffy UN Secretary General's visit to Sudan.

Hearing that Ban Ki-moon is "shocked" by the state of the country is about as terrifying ... and shocking ... as it gets in this mess of a world, and when the phrase, "Time is of the essence" popped out of his mouth, I snarfed hot tea up my nose and spent the next ten minutes choking.

Who... more

Continued from here. I'm not saying Jo Rowling is intentionally bankrolling clapping with one hand and sacrificing children on the alter of 'Gee, the numbers look good', but the CHLG does make me very nervous, and she is a founder ... along with Emma Nicholson, and given her history she really breaks me out in hives of anxiety and has me worrying about the kids who just might end... more

Unless you've been living under a rock, you have to be hyper-aware that July is Harry Potter month. (I live on a rock and have heard all about it, so I'm assuming the information is very widely spread.) The latest film opened last week, the last book comes out at the end of this one, and the ensuing frenzy cannot be missed.

Here's a a bit of a connection that adds to my Potter-ific thinking ... yes, I am a fan: I share a birthday with Harry, and his creator, J.K. Rowling -- the 31st of July. Since... more

Any look at Africa adoptions can be complicated, as this story from Nigeria proves. With international Africa adoptions all being country-specific, a lack of understanding of just how things work can cause a world of problems. In all aspects of adoption, educating yourself is the first and most important step, and trying to do adopt without going through every single on of the steps can lead to heartache.

A Nigerian-born, Canadian citizen adopted a Nigerian child, and is now... more

I'm happy to report that even though the movement to put a halt to the option of international adoption continues to tick over in the US, other parts of the world are catching on to how right it is to present the option of families to children in other countries. In Iceland, for instance, the Iceland Adoption Society is investigating adoption by Icelandic families of children from African nations.

“We are... more