this is bbc news. we'll have the headlines and all the main news stories for you at the top of the hour as newsday continues, straight after hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk with me, zeinab badawi. what can be done to help the children of ukraine? two thirds of them have been forced to flee from their homes. many have reportedly been subjected to physical abuse. some unaccompanied minors are being sent abroad by desperate parents, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation by traffickers. my guest is the ceo of the charity save the children international,

inger ashing. what is her organisation doing? and is the war in ukraine taking the focus off other global hot spots, leaving millions of children in peril? inger ashing, welcome to hardtalk. around 2 million children have fled ukraine. two—and—a—half million are internally displaced. that amounts collectively to two thirds of all the children in ukraine. just tell us what the impact of the war has been on them. i would say that every war is a war on children, and we see that in ukraine

every day. as you said, two thirds of the child population have to flee their homes. about 600 have been killed or injured. and the trauma that children are witnessing every day is something that will be with them for decades unless we support them. so, just to paint the picture — so, at save the children, we are supporting in a number of ways. and one of the things that we do is that we are providing what we call child—friendly spaces. that is a place where children can come play, draw — just be children for a while — and we do that at our reception centres. when children come to those child—friendly spaces, they are invited to participate in different activities. and we had hilda, a 12—year—old girl, drawing a picture of a ukrainian woman dressed in a ukrainian flag and being bombed. a 12—year—old boy writing similar pictures. so, even when the children are safe, they are reliving

the horrors of the war. the trauma is very evident. and, look, we've heard some very disturbing reports about traffickers getting hold of children and abusing them. what can you tell us about that? it is really challenging, the situation. with so many children on the move, they are at the risk of being trafficked. so it's incredibly important to make sure that we have the right structures in place to support them. we haven't seen any reports ourselves of children, but, yes, we've heard of cases, of course. so, what we try to do is make sure that we support children and families moving out of ukraine to make sure that they are safe in ukraine and the neighbouring countries. we are working with authorities to make sure that their reception and their service is keeping them safe. all right — and let me just tell you what the save the children fund eastern europe director iren sargsyan has said of the 100,000 ukrainian children in orphanages and institutions, and

the majority of them remained trapped in the country. she says, "these children are some of the most "vulnerable in ukraine and face a heightened risk of "trafficking, abuse and other forms of exploitation." what are you doing? so, what we are doing is that we are working with different local organisations in ukraine, and we have a big response in poland. we are working in romania, we are working throughout europe as they move as refugees to make sure that they have safe passage and that we provide them with support. many of them need psychosocial and mental support because of the experiences that they have with them, and we make sure that we are supporting them with that. and one example of one organisation we work with — they met a very, more or less, catatonic boy who was so traumatised so he didn't speak, he didn't let anyone touch him, not even his parents. and, of course, a child like that needs a lot of support and help.

and this organisation that we work with, they have therapy dogs. and this dog managed to connect with the boy, and that gave him the safety and the security to open up. so we need to make sure that we give them that support. all right, and i also want to ask you about president zelensky of ukraine has said there are russian troops kidnapping children, and that there are forcible deportations of thousands of children from eastern ukraine in donetsk and luhansk. have you heard about this? so, we haven't heard any reports like that. but of course, we are really focusing on making sure that all violations on children's rights are being reported and that we are, as an organisation, condemning the bombings, the violations that that we witness in ukraine every day. ok, you say that you're trying to make sure that these cases of abuse are being reported, so when the ukrainian government says that the perpetrators of crimes will be brought to justice, as an organisation, and you — inger ashing, as ceo of save the children —

what can your organisation do to help collate the evidence? is that something that you will do actively? so, one of the things that we and many other organisations do in conflict is that we are part of a structure where we are reporting on violations against civilians, and in our case, particularly children. and there are mechanisms within the un system that we are part of, because it is incredibly important that the perpetrators are held accountable for what they do. and do you think they will be? i think we will have to... we all have to do everything we can for that to happen. so, obviously a ghastly, tragic situation in ukraine, but children are in peril and dying elsewhere in the world. catherine russell, unicef executive director, said in may, "we now estimate that by the end of 2021, 50 million "children were suffering from wasting, the most "life—threatening form of malnutrition. "we expect this number

is now higher." how far do you think ukraine has overshadowed other places of suffering for children? i think it's important to remember that even before the crisis and the conflict in ukraine, overli50 million children were living in conflict zones. and we cannot turn our backs on them. we cannot forget the suffering that they are experiencing every day. another consequence of the conflict in ukraine is that russia and ukraine is a large part of the bread basket for the world, so a lot of other parts of the world are dependent on wheat and barley coming from russia and ukraine. and the conflict is worsening the hunger crisis in the world, and it has a lot of further implications on children's rights in other places. but what do you do? we know that 13 million children in yemen, for instance, are really, really suffering from terrible food crisis. i mean, what can you do as save

the children fund international to help children in conflict situations such as yemen, or indeed ethiopia, where there's been a siege in the province of tigray for a long time? you've got people like dr tedros, the director—general of the world health organisation, sounding the alarm bell, saying this is a terrible situation. i mean, what are you doing to try and raise the alarm bell more yourself? so, we are an organisation with 100 years' history, and we were started as a reaction to war and the suffering that children were experiencing during war. and every war is a war on children, and children are bearing the brunt of every conflict. as an organisation, we did respond to over 100 emergencies last year in over 50 countries. so this is part of who we are, what we do. and what we do is a combination of life—saving, humanitarian assistance, long—term development, aid, but also making sure that we are advocating that we are calling out the situation and also

being a really strong advocate for children's rights. if we take yemen as an example, we are really engaging to make sure that we are including women and children in the conversations around what peace can look like. often when we respond to crisis, when we respond to humanitarian situations, we forget to listen to the people that are impacted. and for us as an organisation, we are really, really focused on making sure that children are at the centre of the response, and that they are included in the response. and in yemen, we do quite a lot of work with the children's parliament, for example. so, how do you do that in a country such as afghanistan, which your own save the children website calls the worst humanitarian crisis on earth? 5 million children on the brink of starvation. for instance, how do you work under the new segregation rules and the dress codes and so on, and get to speak to the children under the restrictions of the taliban?

so, as everyone else, of course, when the taliban took over, we really were struggling to make sure that we were able to continue to respond and work in the country. and very early on, we established a red line. we are not going to compromise with girls' rights. we are not going to operate unless our female staff can work in afghanistan as they did before. and this is very much because it's... we are a human rights organisation, a child rights organisation, but also because we know it's more efficient. it's more efficient to have women workers to be able to engage with women and children. and in afghanistan, we are working with mobile health clinics to make sure that we are supporting children and making sure that we are also supporting girls to get access to education, because that is one of the things that the taliban has denied them and are denying them. and we need to make sure that we are doing everything we can to support all children in afghanistan with a particular focus on girls.

all right, so, i mean, look, you have 28 member organisations worldwide with 25,000 staff across 116 countries. you enjoy consultative status as save the children with the un, which allows you to participate in the work of un agencies such as unicef and so on. but one thing that puzzles many people is why don't you just combine your efforts with other ngos working in the same space? 0r combine your efforts with unicef more? i mean, i'll give you one example. nearly 40% of save the children's programme expenditure goes on nutrition and health. why notjust combine that with wfp, world food programme at the un, or unicef? why do you have to be on your own? so, we work very much in partnership in the countries, so unicef, the world food programme, are one of the core partners for us in many places in the world. similarly, we are working in close collaboration with other big ngos

and local organisations. and in a humanitarian situation, there is a coordination mechanism in place where we between us decide and discuss how are we going to make sure that we respond most effectively and most efficiently, and what can we do together? but it takes a lot to get that coordination. and you've got to admit, you don't always get it right, do you? i mean, there's a lot of duplication, isn't there? i wouldn't say that the problem today is that that there's duplication. i think one of the problems is that we are not responding enough and that we are not doing enough. children are dying. we are witnessing the worst child rights crisis in decades. progress made are being reversed due to conflict, climate change and covid. so we need to do more, not less. of course, we need to make sure that what we do is done in collaboration, that we work together and do that in the humanitarian system.

but i would say that most importantly is to make sure that we work with the local communities, the local organisation, people on the ground. yeah, but you there's you, there's 0xfam, there's christian aid, there's care international. there are so many of you, and you're alljust, you know, you've all got your own structures, your own secretariat. and i have to put it to you that, you know, your annual revenue, for instance, is $2 billion a year. you're on a salary of a quarter of $1 million, and you have huge overheads at save the children. i mean, your staff costs alone are $350 million per annum. you spend 13% of your budget on fundraising. duplicate that with all the other humanitarian organisations. do you think that makes sense? i think our work as a humanitarian organisation is more important than ever before. but having said that, of course we need to make sure that we collaborate when needed, and that we are partnering. but that money could

go elsewhere, that's the point i'm making. all your salaries and all these ngos — international, western—based ngos could go on helping the people that you say you want to help. instead, you're spending lots of money on the overheads and on operational costs, and so on, which could be under one big umbrella really. i must disagree with you on that. as i said, i am very much in favour of more partnership, more collaboration, and that is actually one core part of our new strategy in save the children — to make sure that when possible, when things can be done better in collaboration, that we do that. but can you justify all these hundreds of millions, the figures i've just given you? i think... are you value for money? i would absolutely argue that we are value for money, but we, as all other organisations, need to make sure that we are really focused on cost, making sure that as much as possible of all the money that people so generously give us is allocated to programmes and advocacy for children.

and when possible, that we partner to avoid duplication, and that we work much more intentionally with local entities, with local communities. i think that the role of ngos will have to change. you say you want to work much closer with local entities. so, degan ali is a kenyan—based executive director of adeso in nairobi, and it works in kenya and somalia. and they founded a network of organisations led by people from the global south who are trying to reinvent foreign aid by shifting money and power closer to the communities that the aid is meant to serve, which is what you are saying. so, if that's the case, why are your headquarters here in the uk? first, i would like to say that the work that degan ali is doing is really, really important, and save the children are a part of many of these conversations. we have invited her to

challenge us, and we are shifting as an organisation. we are localising and making sure that we are doing less of the work in the global north and more of it in the global south. yeah, your work is in the global south, but what i'm trying to say to you is the nucleus is in europe. your headquarters are in london. you're swedish, so you are also partly based in sweden. four members of your 17 executive board are people of colour, as we say. the rest are white — does that make sense? shouldn't you all be looking — and your board — be looking like the people you are really serving mostly? because then, in that way, you'll be able to understand them better, there'll be more empathy. i think you are onto something that is really important. we need to represent the people that we work with. we need to make sure that we are guided and steered by what they need, and that we are represented by them. and if i look at the staff,

we talked earlier about us having 25,000 people working for us. 96 of them come from the countries where they work. so, if you look at save the children, that is 96% coming from the countries where we work. but of course, we, as everyone else, need to look at, are we diverse enough? what can we do to... but you're not, are you? because i've just said four of your 17 board members are not white. yeah, but that one i need to challenge. in our board, we have 17 board members — that's correct. they come from 12 different countries, countries of origin. that is including nigeria, kenya, zimbabwe, mexico, india. so, we have a more diverse board... the vast majority are white. this is — yes, the majority is white. that was the point i was making. but i also want to say that, as an organisation, we are taking really big steps and i am the first to say that we are not there yet. we need to do more and we need to do better.

but our board has added three new board members to make sure that they are representing the communities where we serve. so, we are on a journey towards more diversity and towards a more localised approach. 0k, degan ali, whom you say you admire, makes the point, says about fundraising, "should be based on amplifying "the dynamic work our communities themselves "are engaged in." and yet, you know, i've looked at some of the country websites that you have for save the children. the one in the us has what has been described as "poverty porn" — you know, the emaciated children, all the babies with the flies around theirfaces — and people like degan ali don't like these images of starving children used to raise money because they say it kind of portrays africans as kind of passive spectators. fair point? i think if you look at how the aid industry have been portraying people in the past, i think that is something that should stay in the past. i think we really need to think

about how we describe our work, not only how we do it. save the children has just gone through a big brand exercise where we are updating our brand, who we are and how we talk about ourselves. the new save the children is very much focused on children themselves, children's voices, making sure that we portray them as competent individuals, empowered individuals... but you've still got those pictures on country websites, haven't you? and i tell you why people don't like it. i'll give you another quote. theo sowah, chief executive of the african women's development fund, says, "when people portray us "as victims, they don't want to ask about solutions "because people don't ask victims for solutions." so i'm not saying this is specifically about save the children, but you are part of this big humanitarian, western—based ngo community, and that's the kind of criticism you're getting from africa. yes, and i don't disagree. i do think it's really important that we stop doing that, if we do it. i'm not here, er...

i haven't gone through all our country websites. but shouldn't you, as chief executive of save the children international? we are just rolling out our new brand work and that contains the stories we are telling, the images that we are sharing. so, this will change in save the children, because i do think that we need portray people and children as active agents in their own right. are you going to be moving your headquarters to africa? 0xfam, for instance, took a decision around 2014, 2015 that it was going to do that, and it has actually managed to achieve that by having its headquarters in nairobi. we don't have a discussion right now about moving headquarters, but what we are discussing is how we become more of a global organisation with our leaders in many different parts of the world, and that we are focusing less on the uk, less on europe. another criticism you get of aid — and this is bilateral aid from country to country, which of course dwarfs the humanitarian organisations, but it is part and parcel

of the whole aid debate — in africa, you're getting people saying, "we want trade, not aid," and you've got the unfair terms of trade. and i'll tell you what thejubilee debt campaign economist tim jones says. he says, "the key message we want to get across is that "more money flows out of africa than goes in. "and if we are to address poverty and income inequality, "we have to help get it back. "the narrative that foreign aid is helping africa is "a distraction and misleading." it's a fair point, isn't it? for all the money you get from your donors and so on, africa really gives much more to the international community through unfair terms of trade and debt repayments and all the rest of it. so, the way i would put it is that — and this is very much a focus of save the children — we need to make sure that the aid that we are providing is building resilient societies, and that we are investing in things that are structures that will help society and children become strong

agents in themselves. part of our strategy, regardless of where we work, is notjust delivering programmes, but it's also very much focused on advocacy and policy change. and regardless of where we work, we are challenging governments on their spend on education, their spend on health, and that includes all the countries in africa where we work. so, of course we need to focus on building strong so, you do do that? and trade is incredibly important. sure, it's more effective than aid. you accept, then, that the kind of work you do, the aid stuff perhaps exaggerates the role of aid in the development process, so when... i don't agree with that way of describing it. with the crises that we have in many countries in africa and other places in the world today, i think organisations like save the children must be there in support and help. we need to make sure that we are doing the life—saving work. alongside the advocacy work. but we also need to address the root causes,

because if we don't, we will have more conflicts, more emergencies, and we need to stop this vicious circle. we need to make sure that we are creating a more sustainable world. so, are you helping to strengthen public institutions or building human resources in the countries in which you operate? because that's often the criticism that little ngo aid goes into that. absolutely. you are doing that. 0k, final question to you, ingerashing — your save the children website says your ambition is that no child should die from preventable causes by their fifth birthday. "all children should have quality, basic education, "and that violence against children is no "longer tolerated." all that by 2030 — really? in eight years' time. that is our ambition and that is what we strongly focus on. but is that really realistic? i think you need to really believe in change in order to deliver it. we are witnessing the worst crisis in children's rights that we've seen for a long, long time. we need to address that,

and we cannot turn our backs on children. we need to be bold, we need to move forward. inger ashing, ceo of save the children international, thank you very much indeed for coming on hardtalk. thank you. hello again. i think it's fair to say eastern england had the best of wednesday's weather. durham was the sunniest place, eight hours of sunshine. and the warmest spot was holbeach in lincolnshire with 20 c. it was a lovely end to the day meanwhile in worchestershire. right now, the weather is quite quiet, a few showers for the northwest of scotland but thickening cloud moving into northern ireland starting

to bring outbreaks of rain. it's mild for the most part, but quite chilly air with us in scotland today, and if you look at where the air is coming from, although across the uk we will all have westerly winds. in the south, the air is coming from a long way south, whereas in the north, the air is coming around past iceland, so from polar regions working eventually working northern scotland, so they'll be big temperature contrasts across the country from north to south. we start off with a band of rain thursday morning in northern ireland, pushing eastward across northern england, scraping into the far south of scotland, north wales, the north midlands as well. the front itself weakens it as it slowly trickles down towards lincolnshire through the afternoon, brighter skies through the afternoon. to the northwest, blustery showers in northwest scotland. this blustery spells and feeling warmer, temperatures 21 degrees by the year gets cooler and cooler the further north you go and in stornoway just 11 degrees. some fairly brisk blustery winds making it feel quite chilly. through friday ,the winds turned to more of a

northwesterly direction, those winds will bring plenty of showers to northern and western scotland, one or two for northern ireland, the northwest of both england and wales, but otherwise, most of you will see spells of sunshine. and the sunshine not feeling bad for the southern areas of uk, 20 in cardiff, 21 in london, warm in 21 in london, warm in the sunshine, but across the far northwest, a little on the cool side once again. for the weekend, high pressure is influencing our weather, but it is moving to the northwest of the uk, allowing these winds to dive in. might well start of sun where you are and a cold start to the day but the cloud is likely to build up particularly for northern and eastern areas, the rest of the sunshine and highest temperatures for southeast wales and england, we should get up to about 20 degrees, just 12 in aberdeen. cloud may be a bit thicker on sunday, perhaps one or two showers around and temperatures for the most part will be dropping a few degrees, so it will start to feel a little bit cooler. should be a bit us sunshine around, but 11 in aberdeen and just 1a in london.

welcome to newsday, reporting live from singapore. i'm karishma vaswani. the headlines — us investigators say all 19 schoolchildren, murdered by a teenage gunman in texas, were in the same classroom. minutes before the killings, he'd posted that he was going to attack an elementary school. in the town of uvalde, there's grief, shock, and anger. president biden says he's sick of the carnage caused by gun violence. the idea that an 18—year—old can walk into a store and buy weapons of war, designed and marketed to kill, is i think just wrong. also in the headlines — britain's prime minister

borisjohnson says he will not resign, after a highly—critical