Press releases

Joint agency release: It is a global scandal that millions of women and newborn babies die or suffer severe injury during childbirth every year – despite the fact that the vast majority of these injuries and deaths are preventable.

Oxfam GB is delighted to confirm the release of their staff member, a Swiss national, Hubert Ballaman, who was abducted in Abéché on 6 June.

In observance of the Day of the African Child, Oxfam urges the international community to act now to save the lives of almost a quarter of a million children in Somalia threatened by conflict, malnutrition and disease.

EU Foreign Affairs Ministers meeting today in Luxembourg discussed how the EU could best support the lifting of the blockade on Gaza. Oxfam welcomes the discussion, but is disappointed that it failed to result in a concrete plan to end the blockade.

EU Development Ministers have just recommited to an old promise made by donors back in 1970s, failing to provide any guarantees to poor countries that Europe is serious about getting back on track to meet the Millennium Development Goals, warns Oxfam.

Oxfam today warned that the Gazan economy, which has been almost completely destroyed by three years of isolation, will continue to unravel unless the blockade is completely and immediately lifted.

Progress achieved during the past two weeks at Bonn will come to nothing if developed countries don’t scale up their ambition. The mood has been more constructive but the disagreements that derailed the Copenhagen talks are still to be resolved.

The European Union has failed to provide clarity about where the €7.2 billion [1] pledged at Copenhagen for immediate climate finance needs in developing countries will come from.

A global bank tax to help poor countries survive the economic crisis must be urgently agreed, Oxfam said today ahead of the G20 meeting of finance ministers in Busan, South Korea.

International aid agency Oxfam welcomes the European Commission’s new aid package of 24 million euros for Niger and other countries in the Sahel region of West Africa, which was announced today in Brussels.