Africa

In Somalia, 110 people died in two days at the start of March as a result of the ongoing drought, according to the Somali Prime Minister. These deaths should have been entirely preventable. Droughts don’t kill people, droughts don’t have to become a famine or a crisis. What kills people in a drought is a lack of food or water. We can’t make it rain, we can’t change the weather, but we can stop people going hungry and thirsty. It is simply a matter of political will, resources and funding. Today, that will seems to be lacking. It risks condemning thousands to a slow, painful, unnecessary death in a catastrophic famine.

Susan is a women’s rights campaigner in western Kenya, who yearns for girls to complete their education. The 39-year-old mother dropped out of school when she was 12 years old. The reason? She endured female genital mutilation (FGM) at the age of 12 and got married shortly after. Now, Susan leads a network of 107 local women who want to bring FGM to an end, and ensure girls can stay in school. 

In seven universities across Monrovia, Liberia's capital, a small revolution is happening. Fed up with sexual harassment and abuse, a group of female students is fighting back, using their own radio show to protect and promote women’s rights on campus, supported by ActionAid Liberia.Women Speak's different chapters work on different issues, led by the concerns of female students, but they all offer a safe space where women can come together, support one another and raise issues to campaign on – from sexual harassment to the right to wear what they want. 

In April 2016 the Panama Papers broke open the secret world of tax havens. The leak of 11.5 million files from the law firm Mossack Fonseca gave the world a look into nearly fifty years of the relationship between tax, tax dodging and tropical tax havens. That scandal has been followed by controversy over Apple’s tiny tax bill and a leak of more than a million tax haven files from the Bahamas. UK Prime Minister Theresa May has rightly called for a crackdown on tax dodging. Ahead of the Conservative Party Conference we look at what she can do to deliver on that call. 

Late last night news broke of another massive tax haven leak, this time from the Bahamas. Developing countries lose billions every year to corporate tax avoidance, money that could be spent on fighting poverty.

As anyone who sponsors a child with ActionAid will know, child sponsorship doesn't just benefit one child - it benefits their whole community. One important way that we're improving girls' lives in some of the communities where we work is through tackling female genital mutliation (FGM), and by supporting FGM survivors. Find out how child sponsorship is playing a crucial role in helping to end FGM.