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CNN Sunday Morning
Project Reunites War-Torn Families
Aired May 13, 2001 - 08:40 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Mother's Day is a time of reunions and phone calls, but what if mother and child have been separated by civil war and the hardships of life on the run and in refugee camps?
Well, "TIME" magazine, along with the International Rescue Committee and the Netaid.org Foundation have undertaken a project called Bringing Children Home to reunite 3,000 children from various war-torn parts of the world with their families.
"TIME" magazine writer Nadya Labi has reported on this in the latest issue of "TIME," and she joins us from Boston to talk more about it.
Good morning, Nadia.
NADYA LABI, "TIME" MAGAZINE: Good morning.
PHILLIPS: Now you spent time in West Africa, is that correct?
LABI: Yes, I did.
PHILLIPS: Please set up the political...
LABI: I was there in -- I was in Guinea two weeks ago.
PHILLIPS: So set up the political situation for us and tell us, you know, why -- how that plays a part in how parents get separated from their kids.
LABI: Well, basically, civil war has been raging in West Africa for more than a decade. Civil war broke out in Liberia in 1989 and in Sierra Leone in 1991. And in the course of attacks, children get separated from their mothers, their fathers and their entire families. So there are many, many thousands of separated children in the refugee camps in Guinea that are now along the southern borders of the region.
PHILLIPS: So talk to us about this project, Bringing Children Home, and tell us how moms and kids finally find each other.
LABI: Well, it's a complicated process. But basically, the organizations try to find as much information on these children and on these mothers and fathers as possible. And they go to public forums like mosques or churches or refugee camps in the morning. And they make announcements about these children and what they know about the children. And anyone who has information will come up to the person and give whatever information he or she has. And through that process, they try to go about reuniting families.
PHILLIPS: So, now, I know while you were there, you actually witnessed a special -- an occasion where a mom and a child...
LABI: Yes.
PHILLIPS: Will you talk about that, kind of tell us what that was like and what exactly happened?
LABI: It was wonderful. I flew with two sisters who had been separated from their mother for three years during the rebel attack in Sierra Leone three years ago. And they hadn't seen her in all that time, had had no communication with her. And I flew with the International Committee of the Red Cross to Freetown and got off the plane with them and saw as they just raced to their mother and were enveloped in a huge hug, so excited to see her after so much time.
PHILLIPS: Nadya, before we let you got, did it make you think about your relationship with your mom and sort of reflect on your relationship?
LABI: It certainly made me very grateful that I don't live in a country that's racked by civil war,and that my mother is only ever a phone call away.
PHILLIPS: Yes, something we should never take for granted. "TIME" magazine writer, Nadya Labi, we'll look forward to the article. Thanks so much for being with us.
LABI: Thank you.
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