← The Interview
The Interview
Catherine Russell, Unicef: War is the worst thing for children
00:29:47
Nada Tawfik talks to Catherine Russell, executive director Unicef, about children and war
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- [00:00]
BBC Podcast Host
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- [01:10]
BBC Podcast Host
Decisions made in Washington can affect your portfolio every day. But what policy changes should investors be watching? Listen to Washington Wise, an original podcast for investors from Charles Schwab to hear the stories making news in washing right now. Host Mike Townsend, Charles Schwab's Managing director for Legislative and Regulatory affairs, takes a non partisan look at the stories that matter most to investors, including policy initiatives for retirement savings, taxes and trade, inflation concerns, the Federal Reserve, and how regulatory developments can affect companies, sectors and even the entire market. Mike and his guests offer their perspective on how policy changes could affect what you do with your portfolio. Download the latest episode and follow@schwab.com Washingtonwise or wherever you listen.
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Neta Taufik
Hello, I'm Neta Taufik, the BBC's New York correspondent and this is the interview from the BBC World. The best conversations coming out of the BBC people shaping our world from all over the world.
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I want to get freedom. I like that freedom.
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Katherine Russell
A gender equal world would be a better world for men too.
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Interviewer
We need a ceasefire.
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Katherine Russell
We need healing. We need trust. These companies don't really. They don't care what governments do. This is a war. The first thing that we want is the war to end.
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Neta Taufik
For this interview I met Katherine Russell, Executive Director of unicef, the United nations agency responsible for protecting and supporting children in the BBC studios in New York. Before taking up the role in 2022, she spent decades in government and diplomacy, including as assistant to President Joe Biden and the Director of the White House Office of Presidential Personnel as well as serving in senior roles at the U.S. state Department, focused on global women's issues and international development. Now leading UNICEF at a time of unprecedented conflict, displacement and humanitarian need. She talks about the impact of aid cuts and the challenges facing children around the world.
- [03:19]
Katherine Russell
To me, the most vulnerable are almost always children, right? Because they don't have any ability to change their circumstance, right? They don't start these wars, they are powerless to stop them. But they suffer so much in these situations. And it certainly bothers me to see it, let me put it that way. I am able, obviously, to do my job, but I have seen many of these situations where children are just in desperate need. And it does make me wonder, you know, what kind of world is this where we can let this happen, happen to the people who are most vulnerable?
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Neta Taufik
Welcome to the interview from the BBC World Service with Katherine Russell.
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Katherine Russell
War is the worst thing for children. Why? In part because they are impacted directly. Children can be killed, obviously, in conflicts. Increased use of drones is really worrying to us. All these things are directly impacting the safety and security of children. Also, children rely very much on government services, right? Education, healthcare, child protection services. Those are almost always disrupted in situations of conflict. So now we have Ukraine started, then Gaza, Sudan. I mean, it has been one thing after another. And where I sit, it feels like none of these conflicts ever really come off our list of worries, Right? We just keep adding more and more. We estimate now one in five children in the world lives in a conflict setting or is fleeing from a conflict setting. Those are really high numbers. And it just means it's stretching the capacity of governments and international community to really respond to that. On top of that, we have had just very serious budget cuts. And so while the needs are so enormous, the needs are growing, the resources have been cut. And I think that confluence of events has made things even more complicated than they were in the past.
- [05:09]
Interviewer
And so if we go back to when you first began leading UNICEF in 2022, do you remember what your most pressing concern then was and what you hoped to achieve? Because it was post Donald Trump's first term. People were still recovering from COVID Russia had invaded Ukraine. So if we go back to that time, what was your most pressing concern?
- [05:33]
Katherine Russell
Such a great question. When I first came in, it was two weeks really before the Ukraine invasion happened. And so I was looking at what UNICEF does, and I had an interest, which is, how do we think about girls? When I was at the State Department, I was the ambassador for women and girls at the State Department in the US And I became so interested in adolescent girls and how they face a certain set of challenges when they drop out of school. In many places, they are vulnerable to violence. They are more likely to get married early. They're more likely to start having children early and often. And it really sets their life in a direction that I thought was very sad. It became so clear to me that the single most important intervention at that point was to try to keep them in school as long as possible. So when I got to unicef, I was assuming that that would be a priority. And in fact, it has been a priority for us at unicef. But, you know, literally two weeks later, Ukraine started. It has been just madness since I got there. You know, one thing after another. And it's been very, very challenging in ways I never could have imagined when I first thought about coming there.
- [06:42]
Interviewer
Well, you say madness because we are facing the most conflicts ever since World War II. And you talk about wanting to prolong education, but in times of emergencies, it really is about supporting children with the very basics. I mean, can you give us a sense about how the needs of children have changed? You look at today's world compared to 10 to 20 years ago, for example, how has the situation for children changed?
- [07:10]
Katherine Russell
Well, let me say it this way. You know, we're coming up this year at UNICEF on our 80th anniversary, which is amazing to think about. And over that time, there has been certainly a development in terms of what has been the major challenges for children. And there has been a lot of progress in that time, too. The international community was able to reduce under 5 mortality for the first time ever in a really significant way. We reduced child marriage to an extent. We got more children immunized. So huge successes. But as you're saying, this time now is marked by just the incredible number of challenges that we are facing, and that is really these conflicts.
- [07:50]
Interviewer
Let's discuss some of the places you visited, because UNICEF works in 190 countries. You've met hundreds of children in Somalia. You went in March. You know, there are warnings about a rapidly intensifying hunger emergency. What was the situation like on the ground for children, and what affected you about what you saw and heard?
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Katherine Russell
Well, Somalia is an example of where many bad things are happening at one time, Right? So Somalia has been a place of conflict. There are real challenges, even in terms of climate. You know, it's very dry. We see very high numbers of children who are malnourished in Somalia. And I saw some of those children when I was there. And seeing a child who is really on the verge of starvation is something that, honestly, I wish I'd never seen in my life. I hope most people never get to see such a terrible thing, because what happens really is a child's body kind of turns on itself and it doesn't have any way to sustain itself. And so you can walk into a hospital setting for children. It can be full of children, often two children to a bed. Mothers are in there, and the whole room is quiet. And it's because children are so weak that they can't even cry. So to see that and to see it as often as I've seen it is really a tragedy, because I think we live in a world where there is plenty to eat, right? There is plenty of food. There are plenty of resources. The question that we all have to struggle with is why don't those resources go to the people who are most in need and most vulnerable? And to me, the most vulnerable are almost always children, right? Because they don't have any ability to change their circumstance. They don't start these wars. They are powerless to stop them. But they suffer so much in these situations. And it certainly bothers me to see it, let me put it that way. I am able, obviously, to do my job. But I have seen many of these situations where children are just in desperate need. And it does make me wonder, you know, what kind of world is this where we can let this happen to the people who are most vulnerable?
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Interviewer
And I mean, just on that point, because many will share that sentiment. I mean, how do you explain to people how the situation has been allowed to deteriorate so dramatically? And when you speak to world leaders, how do you put into words what you've seen?
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Katherine Russell
I try to explain to them and share the stories that I see. You know, I was in Sudan not too long ago, and there I had, you know, on the one hand, young boys telling me of how terrible it was. They lived near Al Fasher. They were fleeing. They talked about how they were always afraid. They were with their families. They would go through these checkpoints. They were constantly worried. They get to a school, and they're doing okay. Then I hear from girls who tell me about situations where there were these militia people coming in. They were raping women, killing women, raping them in front of their families, really, to terrorize communities. So I feel like I see all of it, and I try to share those stories so that people understand. Because it's very hard, you know, when you're looking at the numbers, to really understand what that means for individual children, right, or individual Families how terrible it is. And I think, you know, I live here in New York and sometimes just trying to figure out how to explain to people what that's like. I feel like it's a bit of my job to try to say, look, everyone has worries in their lives, fine. But try not to forget the people who are most needy in the world at the same time.
- [11:15]
Interviewer
And you mentioned Sudan. I mean, 825,000 children under five are at the risk of death from severe malnutrition. But this is often called the forgotten war. Why do you think, you know, the reality of that is not enough to galvanize leaders into action?
- [11:31]
Katherine Russell
If I knew the answer to that, I think I probably would be more effective at my job. I don't know the answer. I think people are. And this goes for leaders, governments. You know, there are so many problems in the world, and I think sometimes it's just hard to get attention to things. Now, my experience is when people do focus on things, they. They don't want to see children suffering, right? They don't want to imagine that children are dying. And I think it's why UNICEF does get a lot of support around the world from individuals and from governments, because when they think about it, they don't want that. It's just that they're thinking about many other things at the same time. And these political problems are not getting solved. And I think where we sit as humanitarians, we're trying to pick up the pieces of that. We are not really in a position to solve the problems, but we have to keep reminding people that they should encourage their leaders to do their best to make these things end so that children have some kind of decent prospects.
- [12:23]
Interviewer
And you've spoken about the changing technology in warfare. And, you know, just because we're on Sudan, you know, you said armed drones are responsible for nearly 80% of reported child casualties. How concerned are you about how AI and changing technologies is going to impact children in the future? When we.
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Katherine Russell
When it comes to conflict, I mean, we're certainly worried about it. This new kind of warfare, which is driven so much by drones or by bombardments, can just be indiscriminate when it comes to children. And I think or civilians more generally. And our view is that everyone needs to be mindful of how these are impacting children. You know, when you go to some of these places, they'll talk about. And this was happening in Sudan, they were saying, you know, for a while, they were hearing these drones constantly over. And I think it's unnerving to people, Right, because they can't see them, but they can hear them. Often children describe it as a terrifying situation. So I think new technology, I mean, on the one hand, just more generally with AI, would say we see tremendous potential in some of our work. And we're working with some of the companies who do AI and just as an example, thinking about education, because we do a lot of education for children around the world. And what we're seeing is, you know, there are hundreds of millions of children right now who are out of school, many more who are in school and not learning. This is a crisis in part because of conflict, but also in addition to conflict. Right. That happens outside of conflict too. And honestly, it's one of the things that does give me the most anxiety and worry because if these children don't get educated, it's hard to imagine what kind of future they have. So we have working with the companies not to use AI to teach children, but to use AI to support teachers and to train teachers. And we think there's tremendous possibility there. But of course we see the dangers. I think these weapons are one danger. Another danger is that there are a lot of sexual images of children on these AI platforms. And we're very worried about that. And I think very much believe that AI needs to be regulated in a way to avoid some of the dangers, particularly to children who are very vulnerable to it.
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Interviewer
And when we talk about education and funding, I mean, Sudan, you have a displacement crisis that makes that difficult. In Gaza, certainly there are no schools. I mean, the living conditions there, you've described it as a hellscape. How can you advance on education and mental health in situations like that?
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Katherine Russell
Well, let me say two things. One is on education, and this is just a bright spot. So I have to share one bright spot, which is we actually are getting children back, some sort of learning situations In Gaza. Not everybody, but we're getting a significant number of children into some kind of classroom. So they're not permanent, but it's better than it was. And so that is a small bright spot is to try to make sure that children have some structure in their day, because otherwise it's terrible they're not learning. And for children, if you say as an adult, two years, I mean, think maybe back to Covid, right? That can be terrible, a two year interruption in your life. But when you're a child, two years is a big percentage of your life, right? And a lot of these children, if they're not in school, a lot of them don't end up going back. So it's one small bright spot is that we are getting children into some sort of learning in Gaza. And I'm happy about that. And having said that, you know, the circumstance there is incredibly challenging for children and for everyone who lives there. There's so much rubble. Water and sanitation is a serious problem. UNICEF does a lot of work in that space, but it is very hard to get all the supplies in the parts in that we need. We're seeing children with, you know, scabies and other skin ailments. We're seeing of children who are being bitten by rats. And I mean, that's a horrible image. I mean, honestly, it's like the thing of nightmares, right? So I think we really need to try to continue to push hard to make the situation better there, because right now there still are children who are being killed in that situation. You know, it's better than it was and we're grateful for that. But there's a long, long, long way to go.
- [16:29]
Interviewer
You mentioned you're making progress in Gaza. I mean, how are you getting kids into schools? How are you able to do that?
- [16:35]
Katherine Russell
Well, the magic of what we do is that we really are on in these communities. We're on the ground before conflicts start, we're on the ground during the conflicts and we stay afterwards. So we know these communities. We have a lot of people who work for us who are from the communities. So we are able to, I think, inspire some trust with the communities and confidence and we know what needs to get done. So there we are essentially intense, setting up facilities where children can learn. And it's not perfect, but it's a lot better than not having it at all.
- [17:11]
Neta Taufik
You're listening to the interview from the BBC World Service.
- [17:19]
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- [19:27]
Neta Taufik
Having covered the United nations for more than a decade, I've listened to advocates and experts, including Katherine Russell, address the UN Security Council with passion, urgency and alarm in their briefings. But lately it's been harder than ever to break through the heightened political tensions that have paralyzed the council and threatened the work of humanitarians. Speaking to Catherine, I could sense that she struggles herself to stay optimistic. And it struck me how her original goals as head of UNICEF were dashed by the explosion of conflict around the world and threats to children's rights that the founding of the UN was supposed to prevent. Advocates like her are instead trying to stem a reversal of progress made over the past few decades. Okay, let's return to my conversation with Katherine Russell.
- [20:15]
Interviewer
You've talked about how international norms are being shredded. I remember in an interview you did on Gaza when you know the man made famine was happening at full peak, you described frustrations as kind of screaming into an abyss to try just to get food to children. And Gaza has certainly turned many people around the world into activists, you know, from students on college campuses to retirees. I wonder what you've taken away from what you've seen in Gaza.
- [20:46]
Katherine Russell
I would say two things. One, I have taken away just how brutal the world can be for children. And how, again, for unicef, that is our focus, right, is how things are impacting children. So how challenging it can be, how difficult it can be, how their lives can go from one thing, which is a life where they are with their families, go to school, have opportunities, to another thing so quickly. And they are living through just horrific things. And when I was there, it was so interesting. I was touring a hospital, and the hospital was absolutely packed with people who were seeking refuge there. And as I was walking through, these two little boys started to follow me. And, you know, they were trying to catch my eye. You know how boys can be. They were little. They were probably like eight or nine, something like that, and they were so cute. And so it was a little bit of hide and seek. And as I went through the hospital, by the end, there was a whole crowd of kids, right? I felt like the Pied Piper with these little kids following me. And it just reminded me that children, even in the most desperate situations, the most horrific situations, want to be children, right? They want to play, they want to. They have that instinct to try to, like, just be a child for whatever period of time they can do it. And that. So I see some of the worst things in the world and some of the best things and just keeps us going, keeps all of us going, is to protect and hold on to that really wonderful essence of being a child.
- [22:15]
Interviewer
From the children you've met, whether it's Yemen, Afghanistan, Haiti, is there. Is there something that connects all of them, despite their individual circumstances? I mean, something that they've said to you or they ask for, or just what you've noticed?
- [22:29]
Katherine Russell
I met a young girl in the drc, this is several years ago now. And she was the one child I remember who is going to be the counterfactual here, because she had just had horrific things happen to her. She was taken by, you know, a militia group. She had seen her sister killed. And she was a very sad child, Right, and understandably so. And then there was another boy who was there also who had seen his friend killed and wouldn't really engage with me. And for both these children, I realized they have seen such horrific things. And later I found out that for the boy, he had seen his friend decapitated. So there are children who I think, okay, I can't feel super hopeful about this, but there are so many children I meet who even in the depths of complete misery, will tell you what they want to do with their futures. I met some girls in a refugee camp, essentially IDP camp, in Sudan. And they were 11, 12, 13, sort of like that age. I can't tell you how bleak it was, how hot it was. Miserable, Sandy, just miserable situation. And I said to the girls, well, how do you think about your future? What do you, what do you think about? And they said, each of them told me what they wanted to be. A doctor, an engineer. You know, I thought on the one hand I was so happy to see that, right, that they could imagine a better future than they were living. But I also knew that the likelihood of that happening was not very high, right. That it would take so much to change and go right for them to have those opportunities, given where they were starting. So I think with children, I see the worst of it, but I also see the best of it. And you did mention earlier this issue of mental health. It is one place where, although I see the resilience of children, I worry a lot about their long term mental health because the mental health capacity of these governments, even if you think about, you know, rich countries, they don't always have the capacity they need to deal with the mental health challenges that young people are facing in their country. So imagine countries that have no resources. It is something that weighs on me heavily because I don't think we have enough resources put into that space. And really thinking about the long term impact of some of these conflicts for
- [24:38]
Interviewer
children, it's been quite a while now since UNICEF warned that a sharp decline in foreign funding would put more children at risk and lead to the scaling back of some of these critical programs. I believe it's 20% of US funding that you've lost and others have also decreased their contributions. So can you give us a sense of what that has meant practically to your work?
- [24:59]
Katherine Russell
Yeah, well, essentially for us, it has been a 20% overall cut in our resources and that has meant that we've done a 20% cut in our costs, which is not a small thing. We've had to cut staff for sure. We have done everything we can to economize as best as possible. But the truth is, is it's been almost across the board. Not every country, but many countries in Europe cut as well. And it would have been easier to withstand one country. But I think having so many countries cut now, they're cutting for different reasons. You know, they're mostly moving resources from development assistance to defense. But for us, the result is essentially the same. So I think it's challenging. Now unicef, we have a very diversified base of funding and we have worked really hard to try to continue to diversify that we get roughly 25% of our resources from the private sector sector. We have many people who are individual donors who every month will give money to UNICEF because they know how important the work is. One of the great things I've seen when I've been traveling is some places like Japan or Korea, I hear stories about UNICEF helped us after the war, and we want to in turn help other children who are really suffering around the world. I love those stories so much, and I do feel we're lucky to have the breadth of support that we have. Many countries nevertheless are cutting their resources, and so it's a problem. But. But I'm hopeful that over time things will get a little bit better. Not sure about that, but I'm hopeful.
- [26:27]
Interviewer
You're saying across the board, has any country kind of stepped up and increased funding? Has the private sector really picked up?
- [26:34]
Katherine Russell
Yeah, there are countries who are trying for sure and have not really cut. Ireland has been fantastic. Korea had a bump, but I think they're coming back strong. So there are countries that are trying. The private sector is stepping up for sure. And I think it's because people see with their own two eyes that children are suffering and they want to try to make a difference. And they know that the governments are cutting. The conversations we have with donors are, please, you know, the needs are enormous. Please do what you can. Do the same with countries. If countries are cutting, we're asking them to please think about how they can, you know, maybe in the next year come back up to where they were. And I think we're doing that across the board. And I'm somewhat optimistic that we can. That we can get things in a better place in the future. But. But we'll have to see the geopolitics of the world make everything more complicated. Because the notion that the multilateral system is a positive and that that ability to help children is positive isn't really a given anymore. It's being challenged in many places. And I think we have to push back hard against that and say the multilateral system has given us peace, and largely, I mean, not entirely, but a lot of secure situations over the world, prosperity in many places. And that's a positive. And that has had a good impact. Children and the numbers of children who are dying from preventable diseases and things. So hopefully there will be a change back to where people see that supporting and helping others is a positive thing for everyone involved, and it makes the world a more secure, stable place. And that's in everyone's interest.
- [28:08]
Interviewer
Have you had to make difficult decisions over which countries and programs to prioritize. Has it come to that point?
- [28:13]
Katherine Russell
It hasn't hit us that way yet, except in this way. There have been countries that have gotten a lot of. Of what we talk about as kind of emergency assistance, essentially, and some of that has been cut. So a good example of that is the drc. Even before it got very grim last year, we were seeing cuts in those sort of program countries and trying to deal with that. And so now, of course, there's really struggling to try to deal with Ebola now. And that's on top of already having cuts to their staff. And so those things can be really, you know, they're challenging for people. And we also had a staff member who was killed there by a drone, which was horrible, you know, so these. These people who do this work are so brave and so committed, but it can be really challenging for them. And it's definitely challenging. But we're seeing in some of those big emergency settings more than anything else, cuts in Afghanistan, which are worrying, cuts in Yemen, so these places where there have been a lot of resources before being cut, and we just have to try to do the best we can and reach the children who are in greatest need.
- [29:16]
Interviewer
You started talking earlier there about this being a moment of significant transition for the world, the multilateral system, obviously, for unicef. What does the humanitarian system look like in the future, do you think? And I don't mean just in terms of funding shrinking, because we're also seeing access is increasingly limited. We're seeing humanitarian workers themselves under attack. We're seeing this return to this might is right mentality that the UN fought so hard against against.
- [29:46]
Katherine Russell
The humanitarian system is under tremendous strain, and the humanitarians are really kind of putting the band AIDS on the broken system. Right. It is the political leaders that need to do better and stop these conflicts in the first place. And I cannot stress enough how important that is. Right. We are straining so hard to address all of the challenges that are out there in the humanitarian setting. And, you know, we could triple our budgets, and it would still be hard because there are too many conflicts. And the political leaders have got to figure out a way to stop these conflicts. So that is point one. And I push on that constantly because I think the world looks to us and says, okay, can you fix these problems? Well, no, we cannot. We can do our best to try to save as many lives as we can. Now, as you said, the humanitarian system also is facing these challenges of violence against them. The dangers to the actual humanitarian workers We've lost record numbers of humanitarian workers. There's some level of impunity about that. Right. And that is not acceptable. These are people who are risking their lives to help others, and they should be protected. And the fact that we're seeing violence against them, for whatever reason, whether it's intentional or just carelessness or whatever, I mean, we need to do better, and we need to try to protect these workers. And I think that even though this is not really UNICEF's job, I also think that extends to the press. People who are in these settings, Right. They're brave, too, and they're risking their lives. And a lot of people who work for the press have been killed in these settings. So I think overall, civilians need to be more protected. And there has to be some sort of outcry by the world to say, you know, people who are not combatants, it's not okay for them to die. It is not okay for schools to be hit or health centers to be hit. And we all need to come together and say, this is not an acceptable situation. And we have to push the people who are engaged in this conflict to do better, try harder, and to make sure they have a responsibility not to do that, and they have to do better by that. It's not enough for us to say, oh, it's a terrible situation. Humanitarian workers are suffering. No, it's the responsibility of these combatants to do better and make sure that they're protecting civilians. That's their job. That's their responsibility.
- [31:58]
Interviewer
So where do you see perhaps glimmers of hope?
- [32:01]
Katherine Russell
Oh, glimmers of hope. I don't see that many glimmers of hope in the humanitarian setting, honestly. I see glimmers of hope in the development situation where if governments are given a chance, and what UNICEF tries to do is really empower governments to take care of their own citizens, right? To work with them to understand what children need to be healthy, right? When they need to be immunized, how to be immunized, how to get to school, what kind of education they need. If we get the opportunity to do that, we know that we can make a big difference to these children. I am very optimistic that the world can be a kinder, more gentler place for these children if they're given the opportunity. You know, it's what gets me out of bed in the morning, keeps us going, right? And the fact that the children, they always give us hope because if they're given a chance, they will make the best of it and they will surprise all of us. I think with their resilience and their ability to go on. So I am an optimistic person by nature. There are days when that's very hard to sustain. But mostly I see potential and I also see tremendous people who care a lot about out the most needy in the world and the most vulnerable in the world and work hard every day to try to help them and support them. And I see a lot of people who support that work with their own resources. So all of it taken as a whole, I feel optimistic despite the enormous challenges.
- [33:31]
Neta Taufik
Thank you for listening to the interview. You'll find more in depth conversations on the interview wherever you get your BBC podcasts, including episodes with the World Health Organization's Hanan Belkey, former Sudanese leader Aisha Musa, and musical icon Sir Paul McCartney.
- [33:47]
Interviewer
Until next time.
- [33:48]
Neta Taufik
Bye for now.
- [34:03]
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