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DRI’s work and media campaigns have exposed to the world the horrors these children face. The New York Times, The Guardian, The Washington Post, Huffington Post, BBC, Al Jazeera, CNN, social media, ABC, NPR, NBC, news and documentaries – just to name a few - have continually covered DRI’s work, including DRI’s opinion and editorial pieces, resulting in uninterrupted pressure on those who have the power to assist in making change.

Bipartisan Senators Introduce International Children with Disabilities Protection Act in US Congress

This bill represents everything we’ve been working on for over two decades. All children — especially children with disabilities — need our support to live and grow up in a loving family. And they need protection against being placed in orphanages or other institutions.

—   Laurie Ahern, President, Disability Rights International

UN CRPD Committee Approves New Guidelines on Deinstitutionalization, including times of emergency.

Dragana Ciric Milovanovic, DRI European Program Director, addressed the UN CRPD Committee on September 9th, on the release of the new UN Guidelines on Deinstitutionalization. Dragana led DRI's collaboration with the CRPD Committee to draft the guidelines, which provide a roadmap to governments, disability activists, and donors about the immediate steps needed to end the practice of institutionalization and residential treatment or care for people with disabilities.

BBC followed Disability Rights International into Ukraine institutions for children with disabilities

"The billions of dollars of international aid being pumped into Ukraine during the war should also be used to shut down orphanages, support families to care for their children and build a community that accepts disability," says Eric Rosenthal, Executive director of DRI.

Side event: Lessons learned from Ukraine: Implementing the right to live in the community for children and adults in institutions during a time of war and emergency

United Nations, 15th session of Conference of State Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Friday, June 17, 2022 10:00-11:15 EST 

Accessibility: CART and Sign Language Interpretation Available
Moderator: Eric Rosenthal, Executive Director, Disability Rights International 
Speakers: 

New Report: Left Behind in the War: Dangers Facing Children with Disabilities in Ukraine's Orphanages

In late April 2022, Disability Rights International (DRI) brought a team of people with disabilities and family activists, including medical and disability service experts, to visit Ukraine’s institutions for children with disabilities. DRI finds that Ukraine’s children with disabilities with the greatest support needs are living in atrocious conditions – entirely overlooked by major international relief agencies and receiving little support from abroad.

Ukraine Emergency Action – DRI Seeks Immediate Support

Your support is needed to protect children and adults with disabilities in Ukraine.  Everyone is suffering.  But babies, children, and adults with disabilities in group homes, orphanages and institutions are lost and forgotten. In this conflict, they are in grave danger of being abandoned by staff -- facing starvation and death.  DRI is sounding the alarm to protect the lives of people most at-risk. Even before the war, Ukraine’s extensive network of orphanages left children without the love, care, and protection of family.

New report: Still at Risk - Death and Disappearance of Survivors of the fire at Hogar Seguro Virgen de la Asunción

Guatemala City, October 13, 2021 - Disability Rights International (DRI) published a report detailing how survivors of the fire and children who were detained at Hogar Seguro Virgen de la Asuncion in Guatemala are still at risk. On March 7, 2017, boys and girls protested the physical and sexual abuse, rape and trafficking they suffered at the institution Virgen de la Asunción. As a punishment, the girls who had protested were locked in a tiny auditorium overnight. In the early hours of March 8, a fire broke out and forty-one girls died.