World

It was 1966 and thousands of La Stampa readers turned to Specchio dei tempi to do something about the famine in India. Our charter flights full of food took off from Turin airport: it was the beginning of an extraordinary story of international solidarity and the foundation is still seen as a leading player all over the world today. Even if about 90% of donations are in fact used in Turin and in Italy, it is also true that we have always allocated a part of our resources for interventions abroad. Multi-year initiatives, not hit and run projects, which aim to make the communities where we operate grow.

With this approach, we have been working since 2012 in Hargheisa, Somaliland, where we have built a children’s hospital: our doctors have trained local staff and every year we manage to save the lives of thousands of children. With the same spirit we are present in Myanmar, where we treat the children of the poorest and remotest communities using mobile clinics set up on boats and off-road vehicles. We stop at nothing: in Nepal, we built a school at an altitude of 4000 meters, on the slopes of Everest.

In Mexico, we rebuilt one under an active volcano, in an area without telephone coverage, where we had to bring the Internet connection ourselves. We went to the Syrian refugee camps to give hope (and English and computer courses) to the little ones who had escaped ISIS. Every day we are at the side of 25 Sinhalese girls who are victims of abuse, whom the courts of Sri Lanka have entrusted to us. It is our commitment against violence towards women: a village where girls can study, play and regain a normal life. We believe that every child deserves to be able to grow up peacefully and dream. And that wherever there is someone who suffers, our timely help and the affection of our donors must arrive. An affection that knows no bounds.