Angelina marks World Refugee Day in a live video

Jolie, Clinton join UNHCR chief António Guterres in live video link to mark World Refugee Day

18 June 2010

© UNHCR/F.Dakhlallah
High Commissioner António Guterres talks to an Iraqi refugee in Al Hassakeh before taking part in the live event.
WASHINGTON, DC, United States, June 18 (UNHCR) – UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie, High Commissioner António Guterres and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took part Friday in a unique live video event linking four locations around the world to mark World Refugee Day.

The event was held in the Benjamin Franklin room on the top floor of the US State Department in Washington, DC, and included participants linked from Ecuador, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Syria.

Addressing the audience of 250 people, media and those watching via the internet, Clinton said: "I hope we can use this day to honour the courage and resilience of the millions of refuges around the world who push forward each and every day with the hope that tomorrow might bring a return home or the hope of a better life. I certainly intend to remain committed to making that hope a reality."

UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie joined the proceedings from the remote community of Berranca Bermeja in northern Ecuador, which is home to a small group of Colombian refugees.

Jolie, who first visited Ecuador for UNHCR in 2002, said the refugees, though isolated, were now receiving regular support and assistance from the refugee agency. "I have noticed a great deal of change here," she said. "UNHCR has done extraordinary work. The field officers have been getting out into the Amazon and going up and down the river. They've registered now 50,000 refugees who are so grateful. It's a very moving story."

Sitting among refugees in Al Hassakeh governorate (province) in northern Syria, High Commissioner Guterres praised the generosity of the Syrian people who continue to host more than 1 million refugees from Iraq. In contrast, he said, "increasing numbers of countries are closing their borders" to refugees.

The programme also linked to a settlement for internally displaced people near the town of Dungu in north eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. Nearly 2 million Congolese have fled their homes as a result of continuing violence. UNHCR staffer Jorge Holly spoke to a man whose family had fled their home to escape violence by the Lord's Resistance Army, a brutal Ugandan militia group infamous for its attacks on civilians.

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+ Angelina Jolie, with 34 refugee families from Colombia living on the border with Ecuador, said they were "terrified" and that almost everyone in the families had someone who had been murdered. "They are so grateful just to be safe," she said.

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Angelina Jolie: New World Refugee Day Video!


Check out the latest video message from UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador, Angelina Jolie, which was recorded at the Amazon Basin in South America.

WATCH: Angie’s First 2010 World Refugee Day Video

The 35-year-old is bringing awareness to World Refugee Day 2010 (June 20), which hopes to bring protection to refugees, especially women and unaccompanied minors. The below video is a female refugee sharing her experience with Angie. Check it out!

Angelina in Ecuador

Angelina Jolie returns to Ecuador to highlight challenges facing refugees
18 June 2010


© UNHCR/J.Björgvinsson
UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie visits a daycare centre run by the Women's Federation of Sucumbíos, a province in northern Ecuador.
LAGO AGRÍO, Ecuador, June 18 (UNHCR)- UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie has returned to northern Ecuador to see how the situation has changed since she was last in the country eight years ago and to raise awareness about unaccompanied minors and violence against female refugees.

The award-winning actress, who arrived in the city of Lago Agrío on Thursday, visited UNHCR field operations and the isolated community of Barranca Bermeja, located in thick jungle on the banks of the San Miguel River, which marks the border with Colombia. The little village hosts 34 families, most of them refugees from the violence that has plagued parts of Colombia for decades.

In Lago Agrío, capital of Sucumbíos province, she had a reunion with a Colombian mother whom Jolie last met here in 2002. "At that time she had a lot of hope for her future," the Goodwill Ambassador recalled, while adding: "She was recently treated for cancer. She still holds on to hope."

The award-winning actress also met with refugee women in a shelter for victims of domestic violence, which is a serious problem in the region.

Some of the women in the centre, run by the Women´s Federation of Sucumbíos, told harrowing tales of beatings, incest and other forms of sexual and gender-based violence. Some women even have to resort to "survival sex" to get lodging to feed their children. Others fall prey to sexual exploitation.

In Barranca Bermeja, Jolie spent time with the community and was impressed by their mental strength in coping with the suffering they had endured in Colombia. One woman fled after two of her family were killed – she did not want to lose any more of her children.

There are around 51,000 registered Colombian refugees in Ecuador, but UNHCR estimates that about 135,000 people are in need of international protection. This makes Ecuador the country with the largest refugee population in Latin America. Many of the Colombians live in remote settlements in the north, like Barranca Bermeja, often too scared to seek help from UNHCR and its partners.

"It's been eight years since I was last here and UNHCR's presence has grown considerably," Jolie noted after her arrival in Ecuador. "They are going into the thickest parts of the jungle to reach the refugees, who are living in very remote locations and in desperate conditions," she added.

"I wanted to come back and meet with vulnerable people and focus on violence against women and unaccompanied minors," Jolie explained. "I am so happy to be able to reconnect with some familiar faces, refugees I had met with during my 2002 trip." Single women, girls and Afro-Colombians are among the most vulnerable of the refugee population.

Jolie will be taking part on Friday (14:00 GMT) in a global live video link from northern Ecuador with Washington, DC, Damascus in Syria and Dungu in north-east Congo. The event, which includes refugees as well as High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, is one of UNHCR's top World Refugee Day events this year.

By Sonia Aguilar and Marie-Noelle Little-Boyer in Lago Agrío, Ecuador

Source - UNHCR.

Angelina at Maddox's School Fair

Angelina Jolie Chats With Kimora and Blends In With Other Moms at Maddox's School Fair




Angelina Jolie wore her usual black to attend Maddox's school fair in LA recently. She spent quality time with her oldest son and caught up with some of the other parents, including Kimora Lee Simmons. Angelina wrapped filming for The Tourist last month in Europe and has since been getting her six kids settled in California as Brad gears up to start work on Moneyball.

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Angelina's moving video on World Refugee Day

Humanitarian actress Angelina Jolie has once again put her superstar status to good use, and shot a 30-second video to help support World Refugee Day 2010, taking place on June 20.



A UN ambassador, Angelina has long been a supporter of the cause and has travelled to numerous war zones, including Darfur and Syria, as well as speaking to Congress in 2009 on the issue.

In the moving 30-second clip, the mum-of-six, who celebrated her 35th birthday on June 4, urges the public to remember those around the world who have been left without a home.

"Having a home, a place we belong, a place we feel safe, is something most if us take for granted," she says.

"Yet those we flee from conflict and persecution no longer have that place. And it will be years before they can ever return. In fact many may never go home again."

"On this day, World Refugee Day, please remember the millions of people around the world forced from their home. Because the only hope of return is to not be forgotten."

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Angelina signed on to play Cleopatra - confirmed!

EXCLUSIVE: Confirmed: Angelina Jolie Signed on to Play Cleopatra!


The Queen of Hollywood is indeed going to play the Queen of the Nile!

Angelina Jolie has signed on to play Cleopatra in a film adaptation of an upcoming new historical biography, a rep for the book's publisher Little, Brown confirms to UsMagazine.com.

On Thursday, it was reported that film producer Scott Rudin had acquired the rights to author Stacy Schiff's Queen of the Nile, Cleopatra: A Life with the 35-year old Jolie in mind for the title role.

Michael Pietsch, publisher of Little, Brown (which will release Schiff's book this November) tells Us:

"Angelina Jolie radiates grace and power, exactly the qualities that Stacy Schiff finds in her biography of the most intriguing ruler who ever lived."

No word on who might play Cleopatra's legendary love Mark Antony. (When Elizabeth Taylor played the ruler in a 1963 epic, her real-life paramour Richard Burton played the Roman politician.)

Jolie's rep could not be reached for comment.

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