An estimated 250,000 children are exploited every day as child soldiers around the world. There are more than 30,000 former child soldiers in the West African nation of Liberia alone, many of whom are eager to help rebuild their country. Now a unique photography program is helping some of them see hope and beauty again, and regain the respect of their communities as peacemakers.

pictured above: A girl looks on at refugee camp near a UN peacekeepers camp on November 07, 2008 in Kiwanja, DR Congo. Over 250,000 people have been displaced after fighting erupted between the rebel CNDP and the army in the last several weeks. According to reports, violence continues despite a ceasefire declared by (CNDP) rebel leader General Laurent Nkunda.

As the Congo crisis continues, over the past days the civilian population has endured more continued fighting amongst multiple factions, cholera outbreaks, separation from family members, hunger, and further losses (of life, property, safety and trust) as both rebel forces and government soldiers have committed many acts of theft, rape and murder while thinly-stretched UN forces have been unable to provide much help.

The organization Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières) has recently launched their own multimedia initiative to “bring global attention to the humanitarian consequences of the intensifying war in eastern DR Congo”, called Condition: Critical (plesae view the video on the website).

[source: Boston Globe]

Photo AP: Congolese vented their outrage at the failure of the United Nations peacekeeping force to stop the rebel advance.

By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN (The New York Times)

GOMA, Congo — When Congo shakes, Africa trembles.

This vast linchpin of a country at the green heart of the continent, covering 905,000 square miles and bordering nine nations, never goes down alone.

When the Congolese state began to collapse in 1996, it set off a regional war. When it imploded again in 1998, it dragged in armies from a half-dozen other African countries. The two wars and the mayhem since have killed possibly five million people, a death toll that human rights groups say is the worst related to any conflict since World War II.

The worry now is that Congo is on the brink again, with neighbors poised to jump in, which is why the relatively small-scale bush fighting last week attracted some of the most intense diplomatic activity Congo has seen in years. The French foreign minister, the British foreign minister, top United Nations diplomats and the State Department’s highest official for Africa all jetted in to the decrepit but important lakeside city of Goma.

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