Venezuela Colombia humanitarian corridor

Thousands of hungry and needy Venezuelans crossed the border into Colombia for a second time this month to buy the bare necessities.

Heavily armed with umbrellas, to combat torrential rain, thousands of Venezuelans went shopping in Colombia for food, medicines and even toilet rolls, which can`t be found in their own supermarkets.

Smuggling of subsidized foods and gasoline into Colombia, led to armed gangs, and a sealed Border has created this bottleneck.

Venezuela`s President Nicolas Maduro blames international enemies combining with home grown subversives, sabotaging the economy.  The Opposition insists it`s decades of sole dependence on the declining petroleum industry, rampant corruption in official circles and chronic mismanagement.

Many are now calling for the border to be completely, officially and permanently re-opened so the bridge between the two countries can serve as a vital lifeline in a time of severe recession.

[Vatican Radio]

A more outward looking Britain than ever before?

In his final days as British prime minister, David Cameron hailed Britain’s 12 billion pound ($16 billion) foreign aid budget as one of his greatest achievements. Britain last year enshrined in law its commitment to spend 0.7 percent of its national income on aid every year, making it the first major industrialized nation to do so.

On Thursday, Priti Patel was appointed as the Secretary of State for International Development by the new Prime Minister, Theresa May.

Ms Patel said: “Successfully leaving the European Union will require a more outward looking Britain than ever before, deepening our international partnerships to secure our place in the world by supporting economic prosperity, stability and security overseas. That’s why my department will be working across government, with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the new Department for International Trade, the Home Office and others.

“We will continue to tackle the great challenges of our time: poverty, disease and the causes of mass migration, while helping to create millions of jobs in countries across the developing world – our trading partners of the future.”

Ms Patel’s comments about aid and trade could give some clues to the direction she might take the department in. In 2013 she said: “A long-term strategic assessment is required … in order to enable the UK to focus on enhancing trade with the developing world and seek out new investment opportunities in the global race. It is possible to bring more prosperity to the developing world and enable greater wealth transfers to be made from the UK by fostering greater trade and private sector investment opportunities.”

[The Independent]

EU announces $161 million in humanitarian aid for seven African countries

The European Commission has announced over €145 million ($161 million) in humanitarian assistance for Africa’s Sahel region in 2016 to address the basic needs of the populations, tackle malnutrition and provide food to the most vulnerable people.

The Sahel is one of poorest regions in the world, with 2 million children severely malnourished and more than 6 million people in need of emergency food assistance.

Funding will be provided to people in need in seven countries: Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali, Mauritania, Senegal, Chad and Cameroon. The EU is working hand in hand with humanitarian organizations to help the most vulnerable”, said Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management Christos Stylianides.

The Sahel region continues to face a food and nutrition crisis. The prospects for 2016 are worrying, as surveys conducted in 2015 indicate a continuous increase in the number of children affected by severe malnutrition in many countries in the region. The European Commission has supported the creation of the Global Alliance for Resilience (AGIR) in West Africa which has set a ‘zero hunger’ goal by 2032.

Mormon Church provides $40 million per year in welfare and humanitarian efforts

[LDS spokesman] Elder Dallin H. Oaks said that each year The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints spends about $40 million on welfare, humanitarian and other LDS Church-sponsored projects around the world and has done so for more than 30 years.

That would account for approximately $1.2 billion on welfare and humanitarian efforts over the past 30 years. Elder Oaks also said that in the last year alone, Mormon volunteers have devoted 25 million hours of labor.

“In the year 2015 we had 177 emergency response projects in 56 countries,” Elder Oaks said. “In addition, we had hundreds of projects that impacted more than 1 million people in seven other categories of assistance, such as clean water, immunization and vision care.”

“Last year, LDS Charities responded to 132 disasters of one kind or another in 60 nations of the world, including a major typhoon in the Philippines, a destructive cyclone in the Kingdom of Tonga, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa and extensive refugee assistance for Syria and Iraq.”

“In addition to such emergency relief we found calmer circumstances along the way, allowing us to provide wheelchairs in 48 countries, maternal and newborn care in 42 countries, vision care in 34 countries, clean water and sanitation projects in 26 countries, gardening projects in 17 countries and medical immunizations in nine countries.”

Elder Oaks emphasized to the audience at Oxford that these humanitarian efforts are separate from the LDS Church’s worldwide missionary efforts. “Our humanitarian aid is given without regard to religious affiliation, because we want our missionary teaching to be received and considered without influence from force or food or other favors,” he said.

[Deseret News]

US humanitarian assistance for Syrians

Secretary John Kerry announced that the United States is providing nearly $439 million in additional lifesaving humanitarian assistance for those affected by the war in Syria. This new funding brings U.S. humanitarian assistance in response to this conflict to nearly $5.6 billion since the start of the crisis.

Through this humanitarian funding, the United States continues to provide emergency food, shelter, safe drinking water, medical care, humanitarian protection services, and other urgent relief to millions of people suffering inside Syria and the more than 4.8 million refugees from Syria in the region.

The humanitarian assistance supports the operations of the United Nations, other international organizations, and non-governmental organizations. Through these organizations, the United States is able to provide assistance in all 14 governorates of Syria.

[US Dept of State]

Funding to encourage Syrian refugees to stay put

Many Syrians in Jordan who fled their country’s civil war have been working illegally. Now under a shrewd, delicate experiment that grew out of Europe’s desire to contain the influx of foreigners to its shores, Jordan has been persuaded to let these Syrians make an honest living–in return for potentially big financial rewards.

Jordan has 650,000 Syrian refugees registered with the United Nations inside its borders, along with high unemployment among its citizens. Under the new experiment, the government has given out 13,000 work permits to Syrians, and is promising to issue up to 50,000 by year’s end–and tens of thousands more in the future.

In exchange, the World Bank is giving Jordan a $300 million interest-free loan, the likes of which are traditionally reserved for extremely poor countries in Africa. Western nations, including the United States, have offered roughly $60 million to build schools to accommodate Syrian children. And Jordan is close to clinching what it wants most: tax-free exports to the European Union, especially garments stitched in its industrial export zones.

In short, Western leaders are using their financial and political leverage to convince Jordan that it is worthwhile to help refugees improve their lot in this country so they do not cross the Mediterranean Sea in flimsy rafts in search of a better life in Europe. It is a stark shift for both donor countries and Jordan, which, after absorbing generations of refugees from wars across the Middle East, had tried to keep Syrians from establishing a permanent foothold.

Jordan is not the only country trying to leverage Europe’s anxiety about refugees and migrants. Turkey has negotiated a deal that involves taking back most of those who traveled across the Aegean Sea into Greece in exchange for $6.6 billion in European aid and a proposed waiver of visas for Turks entering Europe.

Libya is getting assistance from Europe to keep migrant boats from crossing the Mediterranean, an approach that Human Rights Watch describes as outsourcing “the dirty work to Libyan forces.”

[New York Times]

Exodus documentary shot by refugees to air on BBC

A few hours into Hassan Akkad’s crossing from Turkey to Greece in an overcrowded dinghy, he realizes things are not looking good for him, or the 50 other refugees squeezed in beside him. He notices that there is half a foot of water in the boat. Gradually, the mounting alarm is caught on camera, as Akkad films the doomed journey on a hidden camera, and helped create the most powerful and moving account of the refugee crisis to date.

We’ve read about these terrible crossings too many times in the past year, but this is the first time footage has revealed so powerfully what is it like to be on a sinking boat, the engine no longer working, drifting somewhere between Greece and Turkey. The passengers study their mobile phones to see where they are, and whether they have crossed into Greek water. A while later, someone asks: “Is water still coming in?” Akkad manages to maneuver his phone so he captures the rising water levels between a tangle of legs. Soon, half the passengers are out of the boat, hanging on to the edges, trying in vain to bale out the water with small plastic water bottles.

The desperation of such refugees has become a familiar element of news bulletins, but what is different about Exodus – an extraordinary three-part documentary to be broadcast next week on BBC2 – is the way the film is pieced together with footage shot by refugees as they document their own journey. We are with them every step – as they negotiate with the people smugglers for a crossing to Greece (“€2,000 per person, kids half price, every kid under two-and-a-half goes free”), as their dinghy capsizes, as they climb in the back of the container lorries to be smuggled under the Channel, and find themselves near to suffocation when things do not go to plan.

Another family paid €12,000 for eight adults and eight children. Had they been able to take the ferry, it would have been safe and it would have cost €22 each.

Akkad says: “When you watch the news and see the movement of millions of people, you don’t identify with any of them. I wanted to humanize the story. I want people to understand what made us leave and what happened to us on the way.”

[The Guardian]

Use of satellite in humanitarian work

Charity organization World Vision International operates in more than 50 countries around the world, providing support for a multitude of humanitarian efforts ranging from combating disease and malnutrition to addressing refugee crises and improving access to education. With efforts in a diverse range of countries and geographies, the nonprofit relies on satellite communications to facilitate programs in hard to reach areas. World Vision also uses portable satellite phones and Broadband Global Area Network (BGAN) modems for voice and data communication.

The nonprofit uses GPS for tasks such as mapping and monitoring water points, and in the past has used satellite-based tracking devices to track vehicles in some of its field offices. Citing a more recent situation where World Vision deployed satellite communications, Anthony Kimani, IT and business analyst, points to Africa.

“We have operations in South Sudan, where infrastructure is lacking in many locations. As a humanitarian organization, we needed to set up an office to provide assistance to people displaced by the fighting there. To ensure that our staff were able to communicate, we used a VSAT, and provided our staff with satellite phones,” he said.

Humanitarian groups that rely on satellite often have specific needs. Often called into emergency response or disaster situations — natural or man-made — they are more reliant on rapidly deployable equipment with immediate access to capacity. Because of the high cost of satellite communications, many operators and equipment vendors often provide resources to NGOs more so out of generosity than financial gain.

[Via Satellite]