Every year on 20 June the world honours the courage, resilience and strength of refugees. In 2007, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) commemorated World Refugee Day for the sixth time, with the inspirational theme: "A new home, a new life".

With one of the largest displaced populations of the world, Azerbaijan is directly concerned with this problem. Since 1993, the Government of Azerbaijan in cooperation with UNHCR, has been trying to improve the conditions of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDP). This year, the UNHCR office in Azerbaijan, jointly with the Canadian-based NGO "Right To Play" (RTP) organised two "Play Days" within the framework of the ninemillion.org campaign, which refers to the current nine million refugee children in the world. Those "Play Days" were said to involve a total of ten communities and 250 children.

Read full report (2.08 mb) on UN DPI Office in Azerbaijan's World Refugee Day activities.

The United Nations Information Centre (UNIC) Yaounde's National Information Officer visited the Refugee Bilingual School on 19 June.  The school was founded in 2000 by a non-governmental organization (NGO) active in assisting refugees. It provides free education for refugee children and has expanded its assistance to other underprivileged children such as orphans. 

The National Information Officer discussed the United Nations and the work it carries out worldwide. A special emphasis was placed on the Fight Against Child Trafficking which was the theme for this year's Day of the African Child (16 July).

On Friday, 15 June 2007, a workshop on e-accessibility for disabled persons in Russia was held as a UN Country Team joint advocacy project in the context of the International Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

The United Nations Information Centre (UNIC) in Yaounde, in collaboration with the United Nations Childrens Fund (UNICEF), organized a press briefing on 14 June. The objective of the media outreach event was to raise awareness on the theme chosen for Day of the African Child 2007: "The Fight Against Child Trafficking/Child Labour."  The panelists, representing the UN System and the Ministry of Social Affairs, spoke on the issue of child trafficking and answered questions posed by journalists.  Please click here for the complete report.