Insults, violence, attacks on refugee centres. Is this the answer of an enlightened, democratic society, shaped by human and humane values? Fereshta Ludin, high school teacher and former refugee, calls us all to account.

© picture-alliance/dpa/H. Hanschke

TIME has named German Chancellor Angela Merkel its ‘Person of the Year’. Merkel is the first woman named Person of the Year in three decades. The New York-based news magazine praised her leadership on a range of issues, including her handling of the refugee crisis and helping keep Greece in the Eurozone.

@ Reuters/Alkis Konstantinidis

As thousands of refugees keep ariving in Germany, the DW takes a look at women who undertake the long and arduous journey from their home in Syria to Europe. Many of them carry their babies or small children with them.

A women from Syria with her baby as they have just arrived in Münich. @ picture-alliance/dpa/S. Hoppe

Refugee crisis is still a big topic in Europe. As governments obviously not able to find a way to solve this problem, normal people have been working as volunteers to help refugees with food, clothing, toys for children and one woman even saved a refugee’s by taking him to her boat in the Aegean Sea. Read more about her and other news about women here.

A refugee woman carries a child in a makeshift camp at a collection point in the village of Roszke, Hungary, September 7, 2015. @ Reuters/Marko Djurica

Social, economic and political changes affect women enormously. But a disaster is the worst of all.