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More than 300 people have been killed and two thousand injured in Nicaragua, following the crackdown by police and armed groups in protests that began five months ago over plans by Daniel Ortega's government to reduce welfare benefits.

Those plans were reversed, but the violence has continued. In a country where almost 30 per cent of girls are pregnant before the age of 18, and around half never go to secondary school, the Soccer Without Borders organisation had been working to break certain norms in the male-dominated society.

But that work has been severely curtailed - leaving many young women and girls with an uncertain future - as Mary McVeigh Connor, co-founder of the project, explains.

Photo: The aftermath of an anti-government protest in Nicaragua (Getty Images)