Monthly Archives: April 2019

Death of two aid workers in Nigeria lamented by UN Humanitarian coordinator

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The United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Nigeria, Mr. Edward Kallon, has extended his heartfelt condolences to the families, colleagues and friends of two aid workers who lost their lives in Friday’s attack on a holiday resort 220 kilometers north of Abuja, the capital of Nigeria.

Faye Mooney, a British communications and learning specialist with non-governmental organization Mercy Corps, and Matthew Oguche, a Nigerian training assistant with the International NGO Safety Organization (INSO), were killed when gunmen stormed the resort in Kaduna State, spraying gunfire and reportedly kidnapping three other individuals.

Faye Mooney had been working in Nigeria for nearly two years and was known for her devotion to making a difference and countering hate speech and violence. Matthew Oguche was training not-for-profit partners in personal safety and hostile environment awareness and was passionate about helping others.

[AllAfrica]

Devastating floods leave millions in Iran facing humanitarian crisis

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Two weeks since the storms started, relentless rain and flooding throughout Iran has left some 2 million people facing a humanitarian crisis. The deluge has swamped large swaths of the country, from the mountains in the north down to the Persian gulf in the south.

Twenty-five out of 31 of Iran’s provinces have been affected. Officials say 76 people have been killed so far, with some 150,000 homes partially or completely destroyed. Bridges across the country and miles upon miles of road have been left unusable. Authorities say the estimated bill to repair the damage stands at least $2.5 billion. The country’s agriculture sector, which makes up about 14 percent of Iran’s GDP, has been devastated.

The Red Crescent aid group, the Muslim world’s equivalent to the Red Cross, is working with the government to respond to the disaster.

Hussein and Farideh Abdekhani, an elderly couple whose village was consumed by the floods, told NBC News that the family had lost everything they had worked so hard for. “All we have left are the clothes we are wearing. … We have nothing. I don’t know how we are going to rebuild our lives,” she added.

Nasser, 81, a taxi driver in Khorramabad, the capital of Lorestan province, told NBC News: “I have lived here my whole life and have never seen anything like this.”

[NBC]

Jimmy Carter lectures Trump that US is ‘most warlike nation in history of the world’

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The only U.S. president to complete his term without war, military attack or occupation has called the United States “the most warlike nation in the history of the world.” During his regular Sunday school lesson in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, Jimmy Carter revealed that he had recently spoken with President Donald Trump about China.

Carter, 94, said Trump was worried about China’s growing economy and expressed concern that “China is getting ahead of us.” Carter, who normalized diplomatic relations between Washington and Beijing in 1979, said he told Trump that much of China’s success was due to its peaceful foreign policy.

“Since 1979, do you know how many times China has been at war with anybody?” Carter asked. “None, and we have stayed at war.” Carter then said the U.S. has been at peace for only 16 of its 242 years as a nation. Counting wars, military attacks and military occupations, there have actually only been five years of peace in US history — 1976, the last year of the Gerald Ford administration and 1977-80, the entirety of Carter’s presidency. Carter then referred to the US as “the most warlike nation in the history of the world,” a result, he said, of the US forcing other countries to “adopt our American principles.”

China’s peace dividend has allowed and enhanced its economic growth, Carter said. “How many miles of high-speed railroad do we have in this country?” he asked. China has around 18,000 miles (29,000 km) of high speed rail lines while the US has “wasted, I think, $3 trillion” on military spending. According to a November 2018 study by Brown University’s Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs, the US has spent $5.9 trillion waging war in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and other nations since 2001.

The U.S. has also invaded or bombed dozens of countries and supported nearly every single right-wing dictatorship in the world since the end of World War II. It has overthrown or attempted to overthrow dozens of foreign governments since 1949 and has actively sought to crush nearly every single people’s liberation movement over that same period. It has also meddled in scores of elections, in countries that are allies and adversaries alike.

Carter said of U.S. war spending. “China has not wasted a single penny on war, and that’s why they’re ahead of us. In almost every way.”

“And I think the difference is if you take $3 trillion and put it in American infrastructure you’d probably have $2 trillion leftover,” Carter told his congregation. “We’d have high-speed railroad. We’d have bridges that aren’t collapsing, we’d have roads that are maintained properly. Our education system would be as good as that of say South Korea or Hong Kong.”

[telesurenglish.net] Read more on the subject

U.S. Aid Agency staff for Palestinian projects being laid off

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Under orders from the Trump administration, the U.S. Agency for International Development is preparing to lay off most of its Palestinian aid workers in its West Bank and Gaza mission, according to U.S. government communications reviewed by NPR.

It’s the latest step toward shrinking a decades-long U.S. aid mission to build the capacity for a future Palestinian state.  The decision to dismiss the aid workers raises questions about how the Trump administration can implement the Israeli-Palestinian peace plan it vows to soon unveil — with an emphasis on major investments in the Palestinian economy, potentially funded by Gulf Arab states.

“It’s a huge mistake,” said former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro, who served during the Obama administration. “None of this makes any sense,” he said.

The move was seen as an effort to pressure Palestinian leaders to cooperate with U.S.-led peace efforts. The Trump administration said Wednesday that it will unveil its peace plan after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu assembles his new government and after the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which ends in early June.

A former development officer at USAID choked up as he spoke with NPR about his former Palestinian colleagues. “I’m emotional about this. We meant to change people’s lives,” he said, speaking anonymously because he did not wish to speak out against his former employer. “People really believed this is doable. USAID [has been] putting in infrastructure for factories, building hundreds of schools, creating thousands of jobs. There was a real hope there might be a future where we could live independently. Now that hope is collapsing.”

For years, USAID’s Palestinian staff often faced personal risk during armed conflict or threats from Palestinian groups for working with the U.S. 

[NPR]

East Africa warned to brace for food shortages

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East Africa has been warned of imminent food shortages due to the delay or failure of long rains. The situation is likely to be critical in the next six months, Speaker of the National Assembly Job Ndugai warned in Arusha on Monday evening.

“We are seeing less and less rains this year, and this signals an imminent famine,” he said during the launch of the Eastern Africa Parliamentary Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition (EAPA-FSN).

He told lawmakers from ten countries that are members of the alliance that should the trend remain unchanged, Tanzania is likely to face food shortages not seen in recent years.

“In northern Kenya, the situation is pathetic,” Mr Ndugai said, adding that the drought menace has once again hit the entire eastern African region.

The United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) said that this year’s April was likely to be the driest on record since 1981. “Rainfall levels through mid-April will likely be amongst the driest on record (since 1981) in some areas,” said Mr David Phiri, FAO representative to the African Union.

Dr Phiri said at least 7.1 million poor households in eastern Africa are expected to experience food gaps mostly in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia.

Food scarcity will especially hit 12 million internally displaced people in Burundi, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan and South Sudan, and 5.3 million refugees in seven other countries, including Tanzania.

[All Africa]

How smallholder farmers increase productivity and mitigate climate change

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Across the globe, researchers and policy-makers are racing to inform ambitious climate change mitigation targets for agriculture and develop implementation plans that will allow us to limit climate change to 1.5 or 2 degrees. 104+ countries are building on Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to climate action in agriculture.

And there is action on the ground: farmers are employing best management practices in agriculture that mitigate climate change. And because the benefits to the farmers are tangible, increasing numbers of farmers are adopting these climate-smart agriculture practices.

In the feature story linked below, we highlight five specific, scalable agriculture practices employed by farmers that increase productivity or profits and contribute to climate change mitigation.

These cases show that the transformation to low emissions agriculture can come with multiple benefits—for farmers, national food security, water, human health, biodiversity, and more. Read more

Red Cross aid to Venezuela to triple as Maduro stance softens

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The International Committee of the Red Cross is to triple aid to Venezuela, a day after the crisis-riven country’s leader approved the delivery of humanitarian assistance.

The organization announced the increase in the face of mounting calls for the UN to recognize the scale of the crisis facing Venezuela, and amid continued moves by the Trump administration to persuade other countries to back its calls for the removal of President Nicolás Maduro.

With the health system in collapse, and food and electricity shortages now commonplace, the Maduro government has been accused of deliberately minimizing the scale of the problems facing the country even as millions have fled over its borders.

A joint report last week by Human Rights Watch and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health urged the UN to take a lead in what it described as a “complex humanitarian emergency” that demanded a “full scale” international response. The 71-page report documented rising maternal and infant deaths, the unchecked spread of vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles and diphtheria, and sharp increases in the transmission of malaria, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases.

Peter Maurer, the ICRC president, was in Venezuela this week, the first visit to the country by the organisation’s head in a quarter of a century. “I am satisfied with the willingness of the authorities to work with us to address the humanitarian needs we have identified in a consensual way,” Maurer said in the statement.

Announcing the aid increase, the Geneva-based organization said: “The ICRC has tripled its budget for operations in Venezuela from about $9m [£6.8m] to about $24.6m.

[The Guardian]

Poorest countries bear the brunt as aid levels fall for second successive year

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Experts have warned that the fight against global poverty has taken a backward step after new figures show foreign aid has fallen for a second successive year. Aid levels dropped last year by 2.7% from 2017, with the poorest countries worst hit, according to figures published by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Bilateral aid – direct, country-to-country assistance – to the least developed countries fell by 3% in 2018, with support to the African continent down 4% and humanitarian assistance dropping by 8%.

Toni Pearce, Oxfam’s head of advocacy, said: “The overall fall in aid globally is a worrying trend that risks exacerbating poverty and inequality worldwide. Cutting aid to the poorest and most vulnerable countries is a step backwards in the fight to end extreme poverty.

“With refugee numbers at their highest since the second world war, disasters like Cyclone Idai devastating lives, and food crises looming in Yemen and elsewhere, the fall in humanitarian aid is particularly alarming. Vulnerable people across the world rely on this essential lifeline when disaster hits.”

Angel Gurría, the OECD secretary general, also expressed concern: “This picture of stagnating public aid is particularly worrying as it follows data showing that private development flows are also declining. Donor countries are not living up to their 2015 pledge to ramp up development finance, and this bodes badly for us being able to achieve the 2030 sustainable development goals.”

Only five of the 30 development assistance committee (DAC) members met or exceeded the longstanding aid target of 0.7% of gross national income target: Denmark, Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden and the UK. Turkey and the UAE donated 1.10% and 0.95% of their gross national income.

[The Guardian]

Humanitarian Aid and the Loss of Palestinian Rights

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After the US withdrew financial support from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), it is the EU which became the largest donor to the organization.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Pierre Krähenbühl declared that the EU funding enabled UNRWA to provide another scholastic year for Palestinian refugee children. The EU’s funding commitment, according to UNRWA’s Commissioner-General, reflects the institution’s “preserving the dignity and addressing the needs of Palestine’s refugees.”

All these initiatives, while necessary, are not a substitute for the Palestinian right of return and ceremonial fanfare to celebrate these initiatives are nothing but propaganda for the institutions, enhanced by exploiting the participation of Palestinian refugees as recipients divested of rights.

The international political intent is to isolate Palestinians into humanitarian aid recipients. Incorporating the two-state rhetoric should be non-negotiable normalizes the violations and forces Palestinians into a space where speaking about rights is shunned as ideological, while negotiations and losses for Palestinians are deemed pragmatic outcomes.

[Middle East Monitor]

Life after Cyclone Idai

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When Cyclone Idai struck southeastern Africa on March 14, the storm destroyed more than 18,000 homes. The U.N. estimates that over 130,000 people are still in temporary shelters. The death toll is now 598 and expected to rise as officials reach remote areas to assess the damage. And in the wake of the storm, over 2,000 cases of cholera have been reported so far.

Some 148 people live on Rathmore Estate, a vast plantation in Zimbabwe that produces, timber and macadamia nuts for export. Only in the past week have medical charities and community village health workers begun to provide care for the farmworkers and their family members.

Matthew Chidambazina, 42, who lives on the estate, suffered severe arm and leg injuries after the roof of his home collapsed. It took seven days for medics to reach him. “I had deep cuts that went right to the bone and I needed stitches, but I couldn’t get to the hospital on time,” he says. “By the time the doctors came to the farm, they said it was too late [for stitches] so I’ve just been put on painkillers and antibiotics to reduce infection from the pus in the wounds.”

His co-worker, Tichanai Mutungwe, 38, bears both physical and emotional pain. He badly injured his arm while trying to save his 16-month-old child from being taken by the flood waters. The current was so strong that he couldn’t hold onto her. Days later, Mutungwe found his daughter’s body at the bottom of the slope from the farmworkers’ houses. Mutungwe’s right hand has deep lacerations and his chest hurts from being dragged by the muddy waters. He’s been improvising to treat his injuries. “I use betadine to clean my wounds, but we don’t have enough bandages or painkillers for my hand.” And he feels he must recover quickly: “I’ve lost so much, but as a man I have to get back to work as soon as I can to feed my family. They need me to provide,” he told NPR.

Maidei Masawi, the village health worker for the Rathmore area, told NPR, “I’ve been asking for simple things like painkillers, but we can’t get them,” says Masawi. “There are small babies who are coughing and have this flu that won’t go away, but there’s nothing I can do for them. I can only wait to see what we can get from the outside aid.”

Health providers are still struggling to reach people in remote areas. “We are making efforts to get to the patients in the field and we try to give them what they need, but the major challenge is accessibility,” says Farai Marume, the emergency coordinator for Doctors Without Borders (Medicines Sans Frontieres). “We’ve tried to send some medications and team to assist at Chimanimani Rural Hospital, we have a list of the gaps and we’re still trying to meet those gaps with our other [NGO and government] partners,” he said.

[NPR]