The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie is continuing her mission to help those in need, urging the world to remember Iraqi refugees. According to a statement from the UNHCR, on Friday Angelina called on the international community to remember the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees who are still in exile. Read more »
Posts Tagged ‘UNHCR’
UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie Calls for Help
October 2nd, 2009 / Author: OK! StaffVIDEO: Angelina Jolie Visits Somali Refugee Camp
September 14th, 2009 / Author: Mary Beth Quirk
Angelina Jolie is continuing her campaign to bring awareness to the plight of those living in refugee camps all over the world, as an ambassador for the United Nation’s High Commission on Refugees. Angie recently visited the world’s largest camp, a Somali refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya, where 300,000 refugees are trying to survive in a space meant for 90,000. Read more »
Angelina: “I Think About My Own Kids”
June 19th, 2009
Angelina Jolie’s experience as a mother of six has influenced her feelings on the plight of refugee mothers, as the UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador tells Today’s Ann Curry about those suffering in Pakistan.
"It was just such a desperate situation and as a mother it was hard for her to say, ‘We don’t have any food,’ " she says of a woman she met there. "And I think about my kids, and the car, and it’s too long of a drive and you want to make sure you’ve got a snack for them. And to think to go days and days and days and have absolutely nothing to give your children, it’s got to be the most difficult thing as a mother."
As the mother she continues to be to many of those in need, Angie wants to make sure her children grow up knowing refugee children as they do other kids.
"I want them to see it as an area where they can go down the street and play football with those kids and get to know them, and as they grow up seem them as those friends they spent time with," she says. "Hopefully I can raise them with a more accurate view of the world than I was raised with, maybe they’ll naturally be better people."
So if Angelina knew then what she knows now, how would her life be different?
"I think it would’ve gotten me through my youth easier, I would’ve been less self destructive," she admits. "You see people who have suffered things you will never know, and you know lucky you are."
Speaking of lucky, Angelina agrees with partner Brad Pitt, who told Ann this was one of the happiest times in his life.
"I am extememly happy in my life," she says. "My children are healthy and it’s one of the most extraordinary times in my life and I’m able to do good things and good work."
Watch the interview below:
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Thai Government Upset by Angelina’s Visit
February 11th, 2009
Angelina Jolie’s visit to a refugee camp in Thailand has sparked a controversy with their government, which says the actress shouldn’t have been commenting on the Rohingya "boat people" refugees, the AFP reports.
During her time there as the UNHCR’s goodwill ambassador, the UN’s refugee agency, Angelina said she hoped the government would be "just as generous to the Rohingya refugees who are now arriving on its shores."
<a href="http://www.okmagazine.com/pixandvids/gallery/9331/" target="_blank"><img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3534/3182794339_ec1f98e77c_o.jpg" width="163" height="47" alt="Angie2" /></a>
The comment was in reference to alleged abuse by Thailand’s military, which has recently been accused of detaining and abusing the Rohingya from Myanmar, before sending them back out to sea. The Thai government maintains that they are economic refugees and should not be offered protection. The foreign ministry also says Angelina and her partner Brad Pitt shouldn’t have been allowed to visit the camp.
"The Thai government will issue a reprimand letter to UNHCR asking why it allowed Angelina Jolie to visit the refugee camps,"Virasakdi Futrakul, permanent secretary of the Thai foreign ministry told reporters.
However Kitty McKinsey, an UNHCR spokeswoman, told AFP that the couple had passes issued by the Ministry of Interior, and said the visit was arranged with the cooperation of the foreign ministry.
Angelina Jolie Visits Refugees in Thailand
February 5th, 2009
Beyond her duties as a movie star and mother (she’s getting ready for baby #7), Angelina Jolie has pledged herself to the cause of refugees across the world, as the United Nations High Commission on Refugees Goodwill Ambassador, according to an article on their site..
Yesterday the mom of six spent time listening to refugees from Burma (Myanmar) in a camp in Thailand, as they told her of the hardships they suffer living away from their homes.
"I was saddened to meet a 21-year-old woman who was born in a refugee camp, who has never even been out of the camp and is now raising her own child in a camp," Angie said after her visit to Ban Mai Nai Soi camp, home to 18,111 registered refugees. Those in the camps aren’t allowed to leave to find work or go to school.
"With no foreseeable chance that these refugees will soon be able to return to Burma (Myanmar), we must find some way to help them work and become self reliant," she said.
Most of the refugees in the camps on the Thai/Myanmar border are of the Karen minority, which has been facing violent civil rights abuse.
