Following a three-day visit to Bangladesh, UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell urged investment in children, identifying three priorities: ending child marriage while keeping girls in school, fulfilling government commitments on education and health expenditure, and safeguarding learning for Rohingya refugees and host-community children. The Bangladesh Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey 2025 found that 47.2% of women aged 20 to 24 had married before their eighteenth birthday. UNICEF warned that child marriage interrupts education, contributes to early pregnancy, and restricts lifelong opportunities, calling for girls to complete secondary school and for legal loopholes permitting such marriages to be closed.
In Korail, Dhaka's largest informal settlement, children and parents described the effects of poverty, disrupted schooling, and inadequate basic services. Adolescent girls discussed their ambitions alongside pressures that can push them into marriage. During meetings with senior officials, including State Minister for Foreign Affairs Shama Obaed Islam, Russell welcomed the government's commitment to increase education and health spending to 5% of gross domestic product, while emphasizing that implementation must follow.
In Cox's Bazar, which hosts one of the world's largest refugee camps, Russell met Rohingya families and visited a UNICEF-supported learning center. Students and teachers highlighted education and vocational skills. UNICEF stressed that education also protects against exploitation, trafficking, child marriage, and recruitment by armed groups. With humanitarian funding declining, Russell appealed for sustained international assistance to preserve essential services for refugees and the Bangladeshi communities hosting them.
