OTTAWA – The United Nations Children’s Fund is launching a $3.1-billion appeal for funds, saying a record number of children face threats from armed conflicts around the world.
Last year, the aid agency raised only 52 per cent of its $2 billion target, forcing cuts to programs for Syrian refugees and other children in crisis.
David Morley, the UNICEF Canada president, says the four-year-old Syrian civil war and other crises in Iraq, the Central African Republic and South Sudan are straining resources to an unprecedented extent.
The UN says it needs to help 62 million children in 71 countries who are at risk in humanitarian crises.
Morley says the unexpected outbreak of the Ebola virus in West Africa also caught the international humanitarian relief system off-guard last year.
Canada is UNICEF’s seventh-highest donor and the agency is in talks with the Harper government to contribute to this latest funding campaign, which begins today.
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