WorldBridge: Refugees International's Blog

Iraqi Refugees: A New Plan

2008-08-06T15:10:00.005-04:00

The United Nations refugee agency is clear: the conditions in Iraq are not there for displaced Iraqis to go home. Not only is the security situation not stable enough, as demonstrated by this past week’s bombings in Bagdad and Kirkuk, but other necessary factors are lacking. There is little access to basic services in many parts of the country and no mechanism to obtain restitution or compensation for lost or occupied property. Yet, this past month, the Government of Iraq has stepped up its efforts to get displaced Iraqis to return home. Despite the fact that it spent negligible amounts on humanitarian assistance for the displaced both in and out of the country, the Iraqi Government has shown a surprising willingness to provide financial incentives for returns. In addition to these, it has been asking its neighbors to make life a little harder for Iraqi refugees, so that returning home is no longer a choice but a necessity. This irresponsible behavior could backfire and increase instability inside Iraq, as the few who have returned have ended up displaced in their own country.

The international community must unequivocally condemn these attempts by the Government of Iraq to encourage returns when the country is not ready for it, and when many displaced still have legitimate reasons to fear for their safety . The US government in particular needs to increase its assistance and resettlement efforts to send a clear message to Iraq, its neighbors, the international community and, most importantly, the displaced themselves: millions of displaced Iraqis need urgent, immediate help. They and their host communities are running out of resources. We must step up to the plate. Failure to do so would have dramatic consequences and would force many to return to a dangerous environment.

Since 2006, the US has improved its response to Iraqi displacement, both in terms of financial assistance and resettlement numbers, but much more needs to be done. Last week, 22 NGOs, including Refugees International, endorsed a plan put together with the help of Ambassador Frank Wisner that outlines steps the US government must take to address the Iraqi displacement crisis. These steps include significant increases in the resettlement of Iraqi refugees and financial assistance to the UN and host countries, as well as better coordination with Iraq and the region to ensure assistance to the internally displaced and to those who choose to return in due time.

This plan is not the solution to the problems in the Middle East. It is however part of the solution, and the start of a comprehensive strategy to address the needs of displaced Iraqis and the consequences of the crisis in the region. The US can no longer continue to treat this as it would any other humanitarian crisis. The stakes are much higher here, as the future of Iraq depends on it. This is a bipartisan issue, as all agree for the need for a stable Iraq and a stable Middle East. As such, this plan needs to be supported by all.

We hope this administration will do the right thing before they have to leave. Adopting the plan and starting to enforce it immediately would be a significant step in the right direction.

--Kristele Younes

President’s Corner: Saffron Robes in Wyoming

2008-08-04T17:48:00.007-04:00

“What do they think when they see me?” asked the Venerable Kovida, a Buddhist monk from Burma. Given that he was dressed in bright saffron robes and flip-flops while hiking in the Grand Tetons in Wyoming, the question made sense.

In fact most of the hikers who passed Kovida walking in the new Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve last week seemed quite nonchalant. Maybe they were too busy looking at their feet on the path. But for those of us from Refugees International—both staff members and board members--walking with Kovida, the hike was anything but routine.

He loved the beautiful surroundings and told us how much they reminded him of places in Burma that also had majestic mountains, rushing streams and tall trees. It was clear that he missed his country, but it’s unclear when—or if—he will get back there. Kovida received political asylum in the U.S. in March after leading demonstrations against Burma’s military junta last year.

The demonstrations took place during a time of increasing fuel prices and economic stringency in Burma, already one of the world’s poorest countries. Since Buddhist monks survive on alms they collect from the people everyday, “we wanted to give something back” to the people by demonstrating or speaking on their behalf, Kovida explained. Although the monks were leading peaceful demonstrations, the government accused them of violence and started to arrest them and their families. Kovida fled, ultimately to the U.S.

Kovida told his story repeatedly in Jackson, Wyoming, where he was visiting to help Refugees International explain its efforts to protect displaced and vulnerable people in Burma and around the world. He told a large reception at the Oswald Gallery how he had hidden for weeks, growing his hair out and turning it blond so he could escape across the border in mufti. Even though his picture had appeared on the front page of newspapers across Burma, his disguise worked, and he was able to escape into Mae Sot, Thailand, where he gave extensive interviews and met a Refugees International delegation shortly after his escape.

Today he lives in California, working and learning English. His dream is to go to college here, but he is not too busy to forget the suffering of his people in Burma.

In March Refugees International published a report entitled Burma: A New Way Forward. It highlighted the poverty in Burma and noted that the strict U.S. sanctions against Burma’s military regime are hurting efforts to help the Burmese people. A growing network of United Nations organizations, international aid agencies and Burmese civil society organizations are actually getting help to the Burmese people. That network has increased somewhat since Cyclone Nargis in early May.

Burma will not be a prosperous country until its repressive military regime is replaced by a government that cares more about the Burmese people than its own power. Hearing the Venerable Kovida talk about the deprivation of his people makes it clear that we should be doing more to help them now.

--Ken Bacon

Colombia: Displaced Need Equal Attention

2008-08-01T09:31:00.002-04:00

The recent visit of presidential candidate Senator John McCain to Colombia, the dramatic rescue of 15 hostages held by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), and a subsequent visit to the United States by Colombian Defense Minister Santos, have all placed the Colombian Government and its approach to dealing with the violence in that country in the media spotlight. A common theme to these moments has been the notion, put forth by the Senator and the Minister, and repeated by our own Defense Secretary Gates, that the Colombian government has made overwhelming successes in their fight against illegal armed groups, and that “victory is on the horizon.” While it is no doubt true that the Government of Colombia has achieved remarkable success in creating a safe and secure environment in many of the major cities, Colombia has still seen a dramatic increase in the number of internally displaced people in the last two years, and it still ranks highest in the world in the numbers of new land mine accident survivors.

It is troubling that while the Defense Minister and his allies in Congress see fit to congratulate themselves on their remarkable success, they do not mention the most serious humanitarian crisis in the Western Hemisphere. Unfortunately, Colombia, one of the United States' strongest allies in South America, has embraced the attitude and policy of the Bush administration to emphasize military solutions to all of its problems. A recent report circulated by the Colombian Ministry of Defense to the State Department and Congress urgently argues against cutting any of the military support that the United States provides, saying that this will undermine their efforts against terrorism. However, the report makes no mention of the word displacement, conveniently leaving out the victims of the terror they wish to eradicate. Clearly, narco-trafficking and violence associated with it requires a comprehensive approach. Unfortunately, the Colombian government seems concerned solely with military hardware and technology and chooses to leave responding to the needs of its citizens to its civilian agency, Acción Social, and the international community. The United States administration, and the members of Congress who care deeply about Colombia would do well to emphasize to our allies in Colombia that in order to truly reach peace and prosperity, the Colombian government needs to extend its civil and social reach to all its citizens with as much energy and gusto as it has extended its military reach.

--Jake Kurtzer

Uganda: Donors must step up to help agencies address domestic violence

2008-07-29T18:00:00.000-04:00

On our mission to northern Uganda we were told that the biggest immediate danger for women in the displacement camps is domestic violence. My colleague, Camilla Olson and I heard that the stressful overcrowded conditions in camps and the lack of livelihood opportunities for men and women contribute to this violence, which puts the physical and mental health of so many women at serious risk.

So I asked in the camps how a woman could find help and protection if she was assaulted by her husband. Some women said that they could go to local council leaders, although others complained that most local council leaders are male and few listen to women enough. We heard that survivors of domestic violence could turn to Community Development Officers, who are employed by local districts to do social work. We heard good reports about the quality of these officers, but they rarely get out to meet people in the communities because the districts have allocated insufficient resources to them.

Many women said that they would be reluctant to go to the police, because they have seen many perpetrators bribe their way out of a situation. Furthermore, the police are so under-resourced that victims have to pay the police their fuel costs to come out to attend to their case.

The UN and international non-governmental organizations have set up programs to prevent and respond to gender-based violence (GBV) and to build up the capacity of local Ugandan systems to take on this work. At the beginning of 2008, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) took over the role of coordinating GBV response in Uganda from the UN children’s agency, UNICEF. It has deployed coordinators but UNFPA does not have dedicated funds to support GBV programs.

UNFPA in Uganda is now seeking funds from donor governments for several aid agencies to continue their activities after the end of the year. They hope to continue providing legal, medical and psycho-social support to the survivors of domestic violence, campaigning to prevent domestic violence, and supporting Ugandan national institutions that can work long-term in the fight against domestic violence. For example, the Government of Uganda has made a major step forward by establishing a National GBV Reference Group where representatives from different government ministries meet and incorporate gender-based violence issues in their planning and programs.

The U.S. government refuses to contribute to UNFPA’s work anywhere in the world, creating a major limitation for the fight against violence against women in Uganda and globally. This policy should be reversed, particularly now that UNFPA has been designated the lead UN agency on GBV in humanitarian crises globally. In Uganda, international donor governments must support UNFPA to ensure the continuation of GBV programming. If these programs have to close for lack of funds this will represent a big step backwards, and a worrying precedent for other countries where UNFPA has taken the lead.

-Melanie Teff

Chad: Bring us security to return home

2008-07-25T18:10:00.001-04:00

Within the past three years, insecurity remains the primary obstacle to the return of Chadians who have been forced to flee their villages, located in the south-eastern areas of Chad bordering Sudan. Insecurity and violence are also increasingly hampering the provision of assistance to the people displaced as aid agencies come under recurrent attacks by armed men on the roads or in their compounds.

The security situation has deteriorated drastically within the past two years and has become widespread given the persistent climate of impunity. In May 2007, I visited eastern Chad and I was able to travel by car from Abeche to Goz Beida and Koukou without any concern. I just returned from another visit in June with my colleague Erin Weir and we could not do the same because of highway banditry.

The increasing presence of marauding armed men is also affecting civilians as it is disrupting and destabilizing the economic networks of people in the region including those who are displaced. I met several women and men in sites for Chadian displaced people. One of the women I spoke to, who fled in November 2007 in search of safety, says that she feels relatively safe within her new site. However she is afraid of armed men on horseback who roam around the areas where she searches for firewood. (Firewood is sold by the displaced at local markets to earn money.) Some men also said that they are afraid to take their livestock to graze in fields far from their sites because they can be raided, beaten and robbed by armed men. Many displaced Chadians we met said that security should be restored in the area before they could fully resume their traditional social and economic activities.

People displaced in eastern Chad are in limbo as they cannot return home to resume their traditional lifestyle and cannot integrate within their areas of displacement because the resources available to them are not sufficient to address their needs. Nonetheless, there are ways to confront these challenges. My colleague and I released two reports calling on UN officials, international agencies and donor governments to establish lasting security and promote sustainable returns. The people of Chad are counting on these officials to act.
-Mpako Foaleng

Northern Uganda: Real Options for Returning Home

2008-07-23T17:58:00.002-04:00

Displaced people in northern Uganda are slowly starting the process of returning home after two decades of conflict between government forces and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), which forced over 1.5 million people to flee their homes. In June, I traveled with my colleague Melanie Teff to the Gulu, Kitgum, Pader, and Adjumani districts in northern Uganda to meet with displaced people and find out from them what the return situation is like. What we found was the need for real options for the displaced in the form of access to basic services and livelihood support but also in the ability to choose when to return freely.

Ojok, an 80 year old man who has been living in a displacement camp in Gulu district since 2002, told me he would go home tomorrow if someone could help him build a hut on his land. Most of the people in the camp where he is living have returned home or will be returning soon. However Ojok is disabled and cannot build a hut for himself and his wife. His former house was burned down by the LRA.

International donors, especially the US, should provide flexible and timely funds for recovery activities in the areas of return, particularly to improve access to basic services like water, health and education, but also to assist more vulnerable people like Ojok to rebuild their homes and their livelihoods.

While he stays in the camp, Ojok remains dependent on food rations from the World Food Program because he is unable to farm his own land. Many of the displaced people we met with continue to keep a hut in the camps in order to access those services that are not yet in the return areas. Others, like Ojok, have no choice but stay in the camps until they receive assistance to go back.

Building up services in home areas will help to incentivize voluntary returns, but donors must also be conscious of the need to continue providing basic services in the camps for those who remain, in order to avoid forcing people to go back before they are ready.

Even if the LRA were to return to northern Uganda and commit more atrocities against the local population (which many displaced people we spoke with feared given the current uncertainties around the peace process) Ojok told me that he would still want to go home – he doesn’t care about the rebels any longer, he just wants to live on his own land once again.

--Camilla Olson

President’s Corner: Foreign Confusion about U.S. Policies and Values

2008-07-21T16:28:00.005-04:00

On Monday I met with about 30 teachers from around the world who are spending the summer here learning about and trying to understand the United States. They are intelligent, well read and, quite frankly, puzzled by what they are seeing and learning.

They have read about America’s commitment to rule of law and respect for human rights, yet they are hearing about prisoners being held without charge and allegedly tortured at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib. They also wanted to know why the U.S., while working to stabilize Iraq, isn’t more concerned about five million Iraqis—20% of the population—who are displaced.

When we discussed the case the International Criminal Court is bringing against President al Bashir of Sudan, several wondered if the ICC will bring charges against President Bush or others in the United States for the invasion of Iraq or alleged mistreatment of Iraqi and other prisoners. (The answer, for a variety of reasons, is no.)

Their tour is part of the Fulbright Program sponsored by the State Department. Unfortunately, the very administration of the program highlights the inconsistency of U.S. policy. A teacher from Iraq was supposed to participate in the program, but one of the other teachers in the program said that the U.S. government wouldn’t issue her a visa.

This not only deprived the Fulbright program participants from hearing about what is happening in Iraq, but it prevented one Iraqi teacher from discussing U.S. policy in Iraq with a wide range of Americans at precisely the time when both countries need to understand each other better.

--Ken Bacon

The militarization of aid to Africa

2008-07-18T14:30:00.004-04:00

What do you get when, at a 17 to 1 ratio, US spending on the Global War on Terror far outweighs the funding for diplomatic, development and long-term capacity-building programs, combined?

In a report released yesterday by RI’s peacebuilding program manager Mark Malan, we outline exactly what’s happening now, and what’s at risk of happing in the very near future. Foreign aid is being increasingly militarized, meaning more and more of US humanitarian aid is being funneled through the military to go towards the Global War on Terror. There is an increasing danger that civilian agencies, which do important work for long-term stability and development, will lose out to military initiatives focusing on short-term gains at the expense of crucial development and humanitarian aid.

Mark urges AFRICOM, or the US Africa Command, to play a productive role in support of a more stable and secure Africa: “AFRICOM will dominate US foreign policy in Africa for the foreseeable future, and we need to make sure it gets off on the right foot.” To do so, AFRICOM should focus its efforts on professionalizing African armies and security agencies, and creating the foundations for the kind of long-term stability, under the rule of law, that is so essential for growth and development in Africa.

What does all of this have to do with displaced people and refugees?

Africa is home to millions of the world’s refugees and internally displaced people – people who have faced years of violence and conflict that has forced them into terribly unstable environments. Focusing long-term development efforts into building a more stable and secure future would allow so many displaced people to return from exile and begin to rebuild their lives.

Frogs, not chocolate: Post-cyclone survival in Burma

2008-07-16T10:00:00.000-04:00

On May 30th, four weeks after Cyclone Nargis struck Burma, the New Light of Myanmar, one of the government’s propaganda mouthpieces, ran a particularly nasty editorial, accusing the international aid community of being stingy in response to the disaster while assuring the world that the Burmese people were tough enough to survive. “Myanmar people are capable enough of rising from such natural disasters even if they are not provided with international assistance,” the commentary stated. “Myanmar people can easily get fish for dishes by just fishing in the fields and ditches. In the early monsoon, large edible frogs are abundant. The people can survive with self-reliant efforts even if they are not given chocolate bars from [the] international community.”

The commentary, coming at a time when the government seemed to be finally accepting international access to the Irrawaddy Delta region, elicited global condemnation from political activists and human rights groups, as it underscored the cruelty of the military junta and its lack of concern for the welfare of the people. To this day, two and a half months after the cyclone, the international aid effort has fallen well short of the scope and depth of coverage required to meet the needs of the more than two million survivors directly affected by the storm. Outsiders with no experience inside Burma have stated that a “second wave of dying has begun” and made alarming predictions that “hundreds of thousands” of Burmese may die as the result of Burmese government obstruction.

As access has improved to the delta region, however, and the tri-partite aid coordination body, consisting of representatives of the United Nations, the Association of Southeast Asia Nations, and the government, completed its assessment of conditions, the conclusion of the aid agencies is that there were very few additional deaths after the cyclone’s initial fury. According to reports by The New York Times and the Associated Press, there was, in fact, no second wave of dying as the result of food shortages, epidemics, and exposure. The Burmese people in the delta showed exactly the resilience and strength to survive that the government of Burma was touting.

This in no way excuses the government for obstructing the relief effort. The resilience of the people derives from their life-long experience of government neglect and failure to tend to their basic needs. They knew that even in the aftermath of the cyclone they would probably be on their own, or reliant on neighbors, religious institutions, and other non-governmental sources of assistance.

My regret is that I didn’t have the courage to express skepticism about the alarmist predictions of a second wave of deaths as aid agencies gradually gained access to the delta within two or three weeks of the cyclone. My experience in Cambodia in the aftermath of the 1979 famine taught me that in the relatively lush environment of mainland Southeast Asia, once people are free to forage for food they will survive. Rice paddies are full of small fish, crabs, and frogs that provide protein. Fruit and edible plants grow in abundance. Air temperatures rarely go below 75 degrees, limiting deaths from exposure. Contaminated water is a menace, but in the rainy season drinking water can be collected.

I knew that no one in the Irrawaddy Delta was going to die from lack of food. The risk was that a cholera epidemic or a wave of diarrheal diseases might sweep through the weakened survivors, especially children. Thankfully, it appears that this did not occur.

International aid agencies have a long record of exaggerating their impact and underestimating the self-help capacity of local people. One of the primary lessons of the response to the 2004 tsunami was that the true “first responders,” the ones who save lives in the immediate aftermath of the catastrophe, are precisely the survivors themselves. They, and supporting organizations, including local government agencies, are the ones who make an immediate difference, well before even the fastest international agencies can mobilize. In disaster prone areas, therefore, strengthening the response capacity of communities and their institutions, whether government or non-governmental, is an essential investment to save lives in the future.

In Burma, the government and its most powerful institution, the military, did very little relief work. What helped save the day in Burma was the tremendous outpouring of individual and small group efforts by Burmese citizens. Buddhist monks, teachers, doctors, merchants --- even travel agents according to a former U.S. diplomat in touch with friends inside the country ---banded together to raise funds, collect materials, and provide direct assistance. While the military confiscated some of this aid, and periodically blocked access by Burmese, enough of these efforts were successful to help meet some of the immediate needs of the survivors. Coupled with their ability to live off the land as they re-gained their strength, these efforts were enough to stave off a second catastrophe.

“Frogs, not chocolate” is not going to become the motto of the international aid community, nor should it. The blocking of aid by the Burmese government in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis was unconscionable. But the phrase contains a measure of truth, and suggests that we should never underestimate people’s ability to find a way to survive in the face of catastrophe.

--Joel Charny

Visit our website to learn more about Joel's mission to Burma.

President’s Corner: ICC Case Against Bashir is Risky but Right

2008-07-14T18:42:00.005-04:00

As the head of a humanitarian organization, I worry that Monday’s decision to seek charges of genocide against the president of Sudan will complicate efforts to achieve peace in Darfur and interrupt flows of lifesaving aid to millions of people. Despite these risks, I believe the effort to bring Sudan’s leader to justice is correct and necessary.

The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court presented evidence that Omar Hassan Ahmad al Bashir, the president of Sudan, is guilty of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity during the five-year civil war in the Darfur region of Western Sudan. President al Bashir has repeatedly denied the charges, which must now be reviewed by another ICC body called the Pre-Trial Chamber I. If this review concludes that there are reasonable grounds to believe the alleged crimes were committed, it can issue an arrest warrant or take other action to bring the accused to trial.

The United Nations has been struggling to deal with the human toll of a vicious civil war in Darfur since it began in February 2003. The war has been characterized by massive death and displacement; some 2.7 million people have been displaced and as many as 400,000 have died from war-related causes, according to some estimates.

In a summary of the case, the prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo, said: “The evidence establishes reasonable grounds to believe that al Bashir intends to destroy in substantial part the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic groups as such. Forces and agents controlled by al Bashir attacked civilians in towns and villages inhabited by the target groups, committing killings, rapes, torture and destroying means of livelihood.”

Throughout the conflict, which has been characterized as an attempt by an Arab dominated government to displace or destroy largely African tribes in Darfur, the government of Sudan has tried to interfere with aid organizations and UN food deliveries and the deployment of international peacekeepers. The risk of the announcement of the ICC’s case is that such harassment will increase to the point where the delivery of aid to millions of people will be impossible. This would be a tragedy.

Nevertheless, the announcement of evidence against President al Bashir is correct, because those responsible for the death and displacement in Darfur should be held accountable.

Every case of extreme violence or crimes against humanity is different. But in two previous cases where sitting presidents—Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia and Charles Taylor of Liberia—were charged by internationally mandated criminal courts, the indictments helped open the way to peace and reconciliation after years of brutal killing.

It is too early to tell if the ICC’s action will have a similar impact in Sudan. But the ICC action will have an immediate impact on President al Bashir. If evidence is sustained and the court issues a warrant for his arrest, he won’t be able to leave the country, for fear of being arrested and taken to the Hague for trial. The ICC action could complicate the outcome of elections schedule for next year—if the elections occur.

But most of all, the case announced by the ICC shows that when it comes to charges of genocide and crimes against humanity, nobody is above the law.

--Ken Bacon

Afghanistan: Refugees' Difficult Road Home

2008-07-10T15:03:00.004-04:00

Visit our website to download our new report, Afghanistan: Invest in People, and Newsweek.com for some exclusive footage from our mission.

President's Corner: Facing up to Iraqi Displacement

2008-07-07T17:38:00.002-04:00

Everyday I survey a selection of websites, looking for updates on news of displaced populations around the world. The news is seldom cheery, particularly when it’s about Iraq. Two new reports highlight the plight of internally displaced Iraqis.

It’s clear from the reports that security conditions aren’t improving fast enough to encourage significant numbers of families to return home. In fact, the International Organization for Migration estimates that the internally displaced population in Iraq is still growing and has reached 2.8 million. The Iraqi Red Crescent Organization puts the number of internally displaced Iraqis at 2.2 million and says the number is falling slowly. Still, the Red Crescent says, “The humanitarian crisis in Iraq resulting from the displacement problem continues.”

Both reports are on Reliefweb, a compendium of news and reports assembled by the UN Office of the Coordinator for Humanitarian Affairs.

Approximately five million Iraqis—20% of the population—are displaced, either within Iraq or as refugees in neighboring countries. Despite reports of some recent improvements in Iraq’s security, most of the displaced are afraid to go home. “Many [internally displaced persons] do not consider returning to their original areas of residence because their homes were destroyed or because they do not think that security is really enforced,” the Iraqi Red Crescent reports. “Displaced families continue to face problems related to health, education, shelter, income, food, water and electricity.”

Addressing the security and livelihood needs of displaced Iraqis is a key to making Iraq a stable, prosperous and peaceful country. Any joint American-Iraqi effort to stabilize Iraq must include a program to help Iraqis return home. This includes providing human security—employment, health care, education and protection of property—as well as physical security.

Iraq is rolling in oil revenues; it’s time for the Iraqi government to start spending this money on meeting the needs of its own people. And it’s time for the U.S. to start working with Iraq to develop a comprehensive plan to dealing with displaced Iraqis. Most want to return home, but they can't—at least for the foreseeable future. They all need protection.

--Ken Bacon

Meeting our Match

2008-07-03T15:26:00.004-04:00

Two weeks ago, we launched a matching gift campaign in honor of World Refugee Day. We are happy to report that we raised over $24,000 from people across the country in just five days. We wanted to take this opportunity to thank these donors, and all of you who support our work by donating, telling your friends about us, signing petitions, or just staying current on the plight of refugees by reading this blog.

The money raised will go directly to supporting our recent mission in Chad and all of our work around the world. In Chad, Mpako Foaleng and Erin Weir just assessed the dangers being faced by over 400,000 Sudanese refugees and Chadian internally displaced people. Mpako and Erin have just finished talking directly to European Union and United Nations officials in Brussels and Geneva about ways to ensure these people have food, shelter and protection from further violence. Next week, they will return to the US, where they will demand action from the US Congress and Department of State to support displaced people who desperately need our help.

We accept no government or UN funding – this allows us to say what needs to be said to those who need to hear it, and to push policy makers into doing what they don’t necessarily want to do.

Watch this video to learn more about our work and some of our achievements – achievements that are made possible by you.

--Megan Fowler

Chad: Before the Rainy Season

2008-07-01T18:03:00.002-04:00

“The music has played again as is the case almost every year before the rainy season starts in eastern Chad.” This was a metaphor used by a Chadian in eastern Chad last month to describe the recent attacks by rebel groups against the government’s forces. The latest attack is one of many that has contributed -- together with ethnic tensions and the spill over of Sudan’s Darfur crisis -- to destabilizing eastern Chad in the last five years.

I recently visited Habile, a site for internally displaced people (IDPs) situated near the border between Chad and Darfur. Almost 29,000 Chadians have taken refuge there. In addition, more than 20,000 Sudanese refugees forced to flee violence and human rights abuses in Darfur, are currently hosted in Goz Amer camp, a mere eight kilometers away. They will not be able to return home to Darfur anytime soon, given the persistent insecurity in their villages.

However, in Habile, people are starting to consider returning home, especially those whose villages are located in relatively secure areas. Ahead of the rainy season, some people have returned to cultivate their land and start re-building their homes. One woman told me that if the security situation in her village continued to improve, her husband and their 4 children would return permanently.

This glimmer of hope is not shared by the majority of IDPs in Habile. People whose villages are located close to the border with Sudan are not planning to return soon. They are still afraid of attacks, killings and the loss of their property. The root causes of the violence that has forced people to flee their villages have not yet been properly addressed. In some border areas, there are no local authorities or government security forces, leaving these villages vulnerable to attack by armed rebels coming from Sudan.

The latest rebel attacks in the region have made things worse. In the past, Chadian rebel incursions have been followed by armed men on horseback from Sudan who profit from the chaos. They attack and kill civilians, and loot people’s property. These incursions have also generated tensions between communities, breaking the social fabric and weakening the traditional mechanisms for conflict prevention and management.

The UN Refugee Agency has been facilitating a dialogue between the leaders of the displaced communities and those from their home villages. Such initiatives have to be revitalised and understood as an integral part of a broader reconciliation process that will bring trust back among the different communities. This will set the stage so that when people return home to cultivate their land before the next rainy season, they can re-enter their communities and rebuild their lives.

-Mpako Foaleng

Colombia: Finding Solutions for Displaced Together

2008-06-27T15:05:00.002-04:00

Traveling back from Tame to Arauca, on the border region of Colombia and Venezuela, my colleagues and I stopped in a little town called Pueblo Nuevo to meet with displaced people there. We had been trying to reach a local religious figure who was providing assistance to families in need, but had not yet reached him. So, we chose to just drop in and try our luck. Unfortunately, on arrival, not only could we not find the priest, but we also couldn't find the church. People seemed to not know where it was.

We meandered around town for several hours looking for someone who knew the priest. Someone directed us to the church, but no luck. Another neighbor jumped in the trunk of our car to show us to the incoming mayor’s house. However, the mayor apologized and informed us he wasn’t starting his job until July, so he didn’t know much about services being delivered to displaced people. However, he hopped on his bicycle to find someone who might and reemerged, with the priest. Perfect!

We rode back to the church and proceeded to have a long discussion with the priest about the displaced and their needs. Even more fortunately, the incoming mayor sat in on the meeting and was given a crash course in his future responsibilities to those families who are victims of the increase in guerrilla fighting and who have taken residence in his town.

The situation in Arauca is increasingly dire, as more and more families and communities are being displaced in a territorial dispute between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and the National Liberation Army (ELN). This is a place where violence is increasing, and the humanitarian response has slowly begun, but is not yet commensurate with the need.

We visited an area called “4 of December,” which was named for the day when displaced people took over what had been a tent town of vulnerable poor. People are living in homes made of plastic sheeting and wood taken from the forest. The presence of open flames for cooking in homes made of dried wood causes me to fear for the worst. The neighborhood, for lack of a better word, lacks electricity and running water -- a concerted decision made by the municipality in response to the “illegal presence of the displaced.”

Next, we head to Nariño to investigate the needs of displaced people there. I can only hope the situation has improved.

--Jake Kurtzer

Northern Uganda: Mixed messages in uncertain times

2008-06-25T10:34:00.001-04:00

These are confusing times for people in northern Uganda. We have been here only one week, and have already heard so many contradictory statements. We can only imagine how difficult it must be for local people to decide which messages to believe.

When we met with people in one camp for the internally displaced, most of them told us that the main reason they could not go home yet was lack of basic services in their home village – particularly no clean water or shelter. But they still expressed fears that the lack of a peace deal could mean a return to war and going right back to the camps again. One woman told me, “If there is no signed peace agreement that means war and death.”

Not long before we arrived here things were looking unusually hopeful for northern Uganda. Many expected that a peace agreement would be signed between the Government of Uganda and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). The infamous LRA has conducted years of insurgency, abducting people and terrorizing the population in the north of the country. But Joseph Kony, the leader of the LRA, failed to turn up to sign the agreement. The formal Cessation of Hostilities Agreement expired in April 2008 and has not been renewed. Yet, despite the lack of a signed peace deal, the LRA has not conducted any attacks in northern Uganda for over two years.

With the reduction in violence, many people have started the process of returning home from the camps. Almost all of the international agencies are talking about reducing emergency relief programs, and instead working with the government on development projects. But some local organizations have pointed out to us that northern Uganda has seen false dawns before and therefore they remain cautious.

A week before we arrived here, the LRA attacked villages in south Sudan, killing 23 people. Then, soon after we arrived we saw local newspaper headlines announcing that the LRA had re-entered Uganda. The next day the Ugandan army was on the radio denying this report and assuring the population that the Ugandan army reinforced its presence at the Sudanese border and will not allow the LRA to cross. Still, rumors are rife here.

The internally displaced persons’ camps in northern Uganda are not like those in most other parts of the world. People were ordered to move into these camps by the government. Frequently, the camps are less than 10 kilometers from home villages; some are only one kilometer away. Now the government is using strong rhetoric to push the message that people should go back home. The international agencies here give us good reasons for phasing out the camps, such as the recent outbreak of the rare Hepatitis E virus in Kitgum due to poor hygiene conditions in overcrowded camps.

Still, many people hold on to their hut in the camp, moving between it and the home they are constructing in or near to their home village. Some international agencies suggest this is so they can try to claim food handouts in the camp. That may be so, but people are also genuinely fearful. It takes time for a population traumatized by over 20 years of war to feel safe again and to trust that peace really has set in for good. And there are many reasons at the moment for them to distrust these messages. As one local leader said to us, “They were forced into the camps. Now it should be the community in the north which leads the process of return out of the camps, and at their own pace.”

--Melanie Teff

President’s Corner: Mrs. Bush

2008-06-23T17:17:00.005-04:00

Thanks to Laura Bush, we now know that the White House is aware of the Iraqi refugee crisis. President Bush still has not mentioned the fact that 20% of Iraqis are displaced, but the First Lady included an Iraqi in her World Refugee Day ceremony.

Last Friday, I joined several dozen other refugee advocates at the White House to commemorate World Refugee Day. We sat in folding chairs under bright sun in the First Lady’s Garden as Mrs. Bush talked of America’s commitment to protecting refugees. She noted that in the last three decades, the U.S. has resettled 2.7 million refugees and that we are spending $1.2 billion on refugee resettlement this year.

Then she introduced three refugees—one from Burma, one Iraq and one from the Democratic Republic of the Congo—who had fled violence and persecution in their countries. Here is what she said:

Eh Moo Hoffman was born in a refugee camp on the Thai-Burma border. Her parents had fled from Burmese soldiers who tortured, raped, and killed her native Karen people. After more than 20 years living in danger, she and her family were able to resettle in the United States last year.
Zeyad Abdel Okhowa fled Iraq with his family after his work with the U.S. Embassy in Al Hillah put him in danger. Today, he works with the State Department's Digital Outreach Team to help improve understanding between Arab and Muslim communities and the United States.
Rose Mapendo's husband was executed, and she and her children were imprisoned in the Democratic Republic of Congo. She gave birth to twins while she was in jail, and she struggled to keep them alive. Rose and her children fled the Congo on an emergency evacuation flight in 2000. Today, she's an American citizen and the spokesperson for "Mapendo International," a non-governmental organization that assists refugees.

The inclusion of an Iraqi was significant, because it gave some visibility to the huge displacement crisis that has taken place within Iraq. Some five million Iraqis are displaced, about half are refugees who have fled to nearby countries, while the rest are displaced within Iraq. So far President Bush has said nothing in public to acknowledge the displacement, which has humanitarian and security implications for the entire Middle East. Maybe Mrs. Bush will fill him in.

--Ken Bacon

World Refugee Day: Where are the world's hidden refugees?

2008-06-20T09:52:00.003-04:00

Picture these iconic refugee images - an African woman, holding a child, gazing stoically into the camera against a backdrop of huts and tents in a barren landscape. A long line of people, men, women, and children - again, usually African - on the move with all their worldly possessions on their heads and their backs. An emaciated African child being examined in a clinic by a Western doctor or nurse in a vest with a red cross emblem.

These images have become iconic because for several decades they have encapsulated the plight of refugees. But this World Refugee Day is an opportunity to reflect on the ways these images don't really to justice to today's realities.

While conflicts in Africa continue to displace hundreds of thousands of people, this year the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, is highlighting the fact that refugee numbers have increased from 10 million to nearly 12 million due to the persistence of refugee crises in Iraq and Afghanistan.

While the Afghan presence in Pakistan and Iran, still numbering 3 million, has been a reality for decades, Iraqi displacement increased in 2007, with 600,000 newly displaced internally and still more fleeing into neighbouring countries in the Middle East, especially Syria and Jordan. In all, nearly half of the refugees of concern to UNHCR are from Iraq and Afghanistan alone.

The reality of the lives of Iraqi refugees requires further adjustment of our refugee iconography.
Iraqi refugees are not in camps. They live, virtually invisible, in urban areas, especially in Damascus and Amman.

They are hard to reach with basic services. Some, fearing eventual deportation, avoid registering with UNHCR. They gradually draw on whatever savings they may have brought with them from Iraq. Some try to find illegal employment in low-paying jobs in the informal sector.

Their children have had their schooling disrupted, though after extensive efforts, special international funding has been granted to support the inclusion of some Iraqi children in the school systems of the host countries.

The phenomenon of urban refugees is growing. Among the more than 1 million Zimbabweans outside their country in southern Africa are tens of thousands of people who could qualify as refugees living an underground existence in urban areas of South Africa and Zambia.

In Southeast Asia, host countries largely bar Burmese from accessing refugee camps, leaving them to fend for themselves in urban centres such as Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur.

In Latin America, political violence drives the internally displaced of Colombia out of rural areas and into towns, where they live unregistered on the margins of society.

The growth in the number of urban refugees coincides with two other developments: the overall erosion in the commitment of states to asylum for those fleeing persecution and conflict and large-scale economic migration. The twin fears of terrorist infiltration and inundation from illegal immigration have combined to create an environment in which countries of first asylum assume the worst when individuals seeking protection arrive on their door step.

Meanwhile, there are an estimated 200 million people now living outside their country of origin, and only a portion of this migration is from poor countries of the global South to the industrialised world.

With high levels of economic imbalance within developing regions and with poverty often associated with internal conflict and human rights abuses, refugee flows amidst the movement of economic migrants are a common phenomenon within the South.

China, Thailand, Malaysia, India, South Africa, Kenya, and Egypt are among countries that are magnets both for individuals fleeing persecution and for those seeking employment and greater economic opportunity.

These developments combine to pose special challenges for protecting the world's 12 million refugees. While camps will still be required and appropriate in some places - in Chad, for example, to shelter refugees from Darfur - the trend will be for more and more refugees to find themselves either forcibly or voluntarily trying to survive among the underclass in urban areas.

UNHCR and the non-governmental organisations that provide services with its support will have to adjust the way they work.

First and foremost, refugees need to be found. This means being sending teams into urban areas and reaching out, like social workers, to identify vulnerable refugees and register them.

It also involves talking to government officials, who need to be convinced that within the mass of urban poor and illegal migrants there are people who qualify for international protection. Ensuring legal status also goes a long way towards preventing statelessness for current and future generations.

UNHCR will need to find creative ways of providing assistance to vulnerable people. Local religious institutions and community-based organisations should play an important role in delivering the aid, but they will need funding.

Providing cash or vouchers to individual families, who in turn will choose how to spend the funds, is more effective than setting up feeding centers or special schools and health facilities.

To its credit, UNHCR recognises the challenges inherent in the evolving nature of refugee flows and the response of host countries to their needs for asylum. But experience suggests that it will need time to shift its approach.

It can only help if donor government officials and the general public adjust their own perspectives too, and start to understand the diversity of refugee experiences today.

--Joel Charny

Joel's post is part of Reuters AlertNet's World Refugee Day feature. For more information, visit www.alertnet.org

World Refugee Day: Confronting the Iraq Refugee Crisis

2008-06-18T18:08:00.004-04:00

Today nearly five million Iraqis--20% of the population--are displaced. About half of them have fled the country and live as refugees throughout the Middle East, while the rest are displaced within Iraq. Most fled their homes because they felt unsafe; those who worked for the U.S. as translators or drivers fled after they were attacked as collaborators. Most refugees and internally displaced lack access to employment, education and medical care; they are facing shortages of food and money.

This is a humanitarian crisis first, but it is also becoming a security problem.

Refugees International recently issued a report that found that internally displaced Iraqis were turning increasingly to militia groups, not the government, for support. "As a result of the vacuum created by the failure of both the Iraqi Government and the international community to act in a timely and adequate manner, non-state actors play a major role in providing assistance to vulnerable Iraqis," the report, Uprooted and Unstable, said. "Through a 'Hezbollah-like' scheme, the Shiite Sadrist movement has established itself as the main service provider in the country."

Militias, not the government, are winning the loyalty of aid recipients. This poses an obvious threat to what the U.S. most wants in Iraq--a stable, peaceful country run by a publicly supported government under the rule of law.

Yet the U.S. seems strangely casual about the impact of massive displacement in and from Iraq. President Bush has never mentioned the plight of displaced Iraqis, and other White House officials act as though the problem doesn't exist. The State Department's June 11 Iraq Weekly Status Report barely mentions Iraqi displacement.

The State Department is far from tone deaf to the plight of displaced Iraqis, particularly those who have worked for the United States. Secretary Rice has appointed an ambassador, James B. Foley, as Senior Coordinator for Iraqi Refugee Issues. At a press conference earlier this month, Foley said that "we believe that we have special obligations to Iraqis who have been employed by the United States or have been closely associated with U.S. efforts in Iraq." Yet most of the pressure to help these so-called Iraqi allies has come from Congress, not the administration.
The United States has vowed to allow 12,000 Iraqis to resettle in the U.S. this year, but eight months into the fiscal year, it has resettled only 4,742. Reaching the goal is still possible, if everything goes right.

What's more, the United States will spend more than $200 million this year to help displaced Iraqis. Unfortunately, that is just a drop in the bucket compared to what it costs surrounding countries to host Iraqi refugees. Jordan says it is laying out about $1 billion a year to accommodate about 500,000 Iraqis, and Syria, which hosts about l.5 million, says the cost is several billion dollars a year.

The surge has reduced violence in Iraq, but not enough to enable safe return of displaced Iraqis. Until it does, the United States needs to pay more attention to meeting the needs of nearly five million displaced Iraqis whose loyalty will be won by those who help them.

--Ken Bacon

In honor of World Refugee Day, UN Dispatch's Delegates Lounge will be featuring Ken's post for the coming week.

World Refugee Day: Reflections from Chad

2008-06-16T18:10:00.002-04:00

This Friday, June 20, is World Refugee Day. It is a day to recognize the struggle of some 12 million refugees worldwide who have been forced out of their homes and homelands by fear, conflict, and persecution. It is also an opportunity for many of us to try to appreciate just what it means to have a safe place to go home to, and to remember that no conflict happens in isolation. Insecurity anywhere threatens peace everywhere.

Consider this; there are almost 3 million refugees in Africa, many of whom have escaped one dangerous place, only to find themselves in the heart of another conflict.

Today, I am writing from Chad, a country rocked by its own protracted civil war, internal ethnic tensions, and widespread banditry. Still, it hosts roughly 243,000 Sudanese refugees fleeing indiscriminate attacks, summary executions, bombings, and the destruction of whole villages in neighboring Darfur. My colleague and I met a woman who had fled Darfur just 3 months ago with her four children. She told us how she crossed the border and lived under a tree with seven other families for six weeks before being moved to a refugee camp in eastern Chad. Days before I met this woman, Chadian rebels launched a new offensive in eastern Chad.

The two conflicts are interrelated, and the human fallout can be seen in both countries. Still – inexplicably -- the massive popular and political interest in Darfur stops at the Sudan/Chad border, and the international community has proven itself to be unwilling to take a regional approach to the resolution of these interlinked crises.

The world has chosen to care about Sudan, and yet the ongoing crisis in Chad has been all but ignored by international policy makers.

In contrast to this game of pick-and-choose that the international community has been content to play in they case of Chad and Sudan, the laws that protect refugees -- the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, and the Geneva Conventions – are built on the premise of common humanity, and the equal value of every human life. Similarly, the UN was built on the recognition that violent instability in any country represents a threat to international peace and security.

The world is small. Violence and suffering anywhere will have consequences for us everywhere.

While we recognize the tremendous challenges faced and overcome by refugees in the world today, also take a moment to remember that the modern history of conflict and refugee movements shows us just how interlinked our lives are. Conflict all too quickly reaches out and crosses the lines we have drawn to separate ourselves from our neighbors.

--Erin Weir

Honor World Refugee Day with a gift to Refugees International. Two generous donors have promised to match every online gift this week, dollar for dollar, in support of our work for refugees in Chad and around the world. Double your impact and give today.

Burma: Need for Aid Trumps Political Goals

2008-06-13T15:00:00.004-04:00

After the destruction wreaked in Burma by Cyclone Nargis, the United States made the wise decision to set aside its political disagreements with the government of Burma to make every effort to ensure that humanitarian assistance reached those in need. As a result of this decision, the U.S. has been remarkably generous, donating almost $38 million to the relief effort, while playing an instrumental role in transporting goods into Burma, now having flown over 150 flights with emergency goods into the country on U.S. planes.

The U.S. has also backed diplomatic efforts to engage the Burmese government on humanitarian issues, and supports the Tripartite Core Group (the cyclone response group comprised of representatives from the government of Burma, the United Nations, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations). The TCG, as it is known, has provided unprecedented opportunities for international engagement with Burmese officials. It is also carrying out a comprehensive, village-by-village assessment of the cyclone damage – the first study of its kind in Burma for decades (the regime dislikes statistical surveys and studies that could highlight the impact of their mismanagement). These steps represent real progress – not just for those Burmese who need assistance – but in the ability to establish a substantive dialogue between the reclusive government of Burma and the rest of the world.

Of course, news on the humanitarian front is not all good – for each step forward, there are complications. International staff are now allowed into the worst-affected areas of the delta, but can only stay for 72 hours. New restrictive guidelines have been issued to NGOs, but there are real questions as to how strictly they will be implemented. A similar move to issue guidelines to NGOs in 2006 was never fully implemented, allowing agencies to work under acceptable conditions. More aid is reaching cyclone victims every day, but everyone agrees that the response is still a shadow of what is really needed.

In the past week, Refugees International has begun to receive indications from U.S. government officials that their patience with the slow progress on humanitarian issues in Burma is beginning to wear thin, begging the question of how much longer the U.S. will be willing to accept the isolation of humanitarian issues from their concerns about political oppression. At a Refugees International-sponsored briefing on Thursday, a House Foreign Affairs staff member asked a panel of agencies that are operational in Burma if the renewal of US sanctions against Burma in July would hamper their operations. After receiving a unanimous yes from the panelists, he expressed concern over this impact, but also indicated that the bill would have to go forward anyway.

Similarly, discussions with administration officials in the past week have revealed frustration that the humanitarian agenda is “overshadowing U.S. political goals” in Burma. When discussing the overall humanitarian response, an official said that the pendulum had swung as far towards the humanitarian agenda as it was going to go; he indicated that we would see more of a return to pre-cyclone Burma policies in the upcoming months.

What does all of this mean for the humanitarian community working on Burma? Clearly, there is a growing need for the community to be much more proactive in describing its successes so that political actors continue to see the value in the relief effort. There also needs to be a unified presentation of the setbacks and difficulties, so that the U.S., working with the Tripartite Core Group, can press the Burmese government on issues of concern to the humanitarian community.

After pushing so hard over the past month to gain concessions from the Burmese government, which has resulted in improvements in humanitarian access, now is not the time to abandon this approach. There are more agencies providing more assistance inside the country now than at any time in the past decade. As long as these programs are reaching vulnerable cyclone survivors, the U.S. should stay the humanitarian course, while working with its allies around the world to press the Burmese government on the issues of political freedoms and human rights that are a global concern.

--Joel Charny

Visit our website to learn more about our work in Burma.

Empowering Women in the Fight Against Gender-Based Violence

2008-06-11T16:27:00.004-04:00

Violence against women is an international problem, but many countries and policymakers turn a blind eye to the prevalence of such abuse. Although there are many obstacles to preventing gender-based violence, including misperceptions of rape survivors, lack of funding and the absence of proper sexual assault services, there is hope. The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars recently hosted a panel to discuss the real statistics of GBV and plausible models for addressing this problem during conflict as well as within societies rebuilding after conflict.

Heidi Lehmann of the International Rescue Committee shared one approach in Liberia. Since 1989, Liberia’s civil war had created a breeding ground for violence against women. A 2005 survey in 4 countries indicated that 91.7% of 1,216 women and girls interviewed had been subjected to multiple violent acts during Liberia’s conflict. Displaced widows, wives, orphans, children, husbands, and brothers could be found in cramped camps around the country.

The IRC had been training health care and social workers to respond to rape survivors. However, they discovered that the most effective way to prevent gender-based violence was to involve the women in the solution. IRC conducted one-on-one interviews with women and children in the camps, assessing where the more dangerous areas were and what could be done to make them safer. Because of cramped quarters and food shortages, there were more opportunities for physical and sexual assault. Following the interviews, social workers went out into the community empowering women to come forward, seek justice and demand change. They also built a center for a group of local women who have committed to preventing gender-based violence in their community.

Still, more needs to be done in Liberia. When Refugees International was there last fall, we went looking for the text of the Rape Amendment Act that had passed in 2006 – a landmark victory for women’s groups in the country who seek justice for victims of sexual assault. However, few people had a copy of the law and groups regularly complained about its lack of enforcement. Progress in Liberia will not continue -- for women or men -- without substantially improving the nation’s justice system and giving it the resources and expertise necessary to carry out real reforms.

In order to encourage survivors to seek help and justice, it is absolutely necessary to have programs that they can depend on to provide the protective services and justice promised to them.

--Kimberly Compton

Afghanistan: Seeking Neutral Space

2008-06-09T16:52:00.003-04:00

Yesterday, Laura Bush was in Afghanistan, hailing the progress made since 2001 in the reconstruction process. She spent nine hours total in country, flying from Kabul to Bamyan, where she stayed within the four walls of a New Zealand Provincial Reconstruction Team compound. From there, the media reported, she could see the empty spaces left by the destruction of the giant Buddhas in 2001, the world’s best-known reminder of the Taliban brutality.

Mrs. Bush could not see, however, that Afghanistan is still struggling, and its government is unable to meet the humanitarian needs of a large portion of its population. Despite the US-led efforts to convey the image of a successful nation-building exercise, almost seven years after the NATO intervention, Afghanistan remains fragmented and unstable. Its central government barely holds power over the capital, Kabul, let alone the rest of the country. In many areas of the south, the west, and the east --- and increasingly in the center and the north of the country --- the war continues, displacing thousands and causing hundreds of civilian casualties every month.

Millions of Afghan refugees have returned to this situation. Since 2002, the repatriation process has been ongoing, with five million Afghans leaving Pakistan and Iran to return to their devastated, often dangerous villages throughout the country. With Afghanistan “no longer at war,” neighboring countries of asylum increasingly desired to see the populations they hosted return home. As a result, many Afghans were deported from Iran and others were forced to leave the Pakistani camps they were born in. One woman in a refugee camp near Peshawar told me, “We might as well return now before the Pakistani government cuts our electricity and destroys our business.”

The UN is severely limited in what it can do to help Afghan returnees and internally displaced people. The UN mission to Afghanistan is first and foremost a political mission, designed to support the central government and the international community’s agenda. But in a context where the international community and the government it supports are parties to the conflict, where does impartial humanitarian work fit in? “It is very clear that I am here to win a war,” an aid worker told us in Kabul. “There is no space for humanitarianism in Afghanistan.”

It took the UN four years and considerable pressure from the media and civil society to finally declare a humanitarian crisis in Iraq. Millions of displaced people and tens of thousands of deaths later, the US government and its Iraqi counterpart were still talking about “development” and “reconstruction.” It is hard not to draw a parallel with Afghanistan, where for-profit development contractors and the Provincial Reconstruction Teams have billions of dollars at their disposal while humanitarian agencies are struggling to feed and house the neediest. It is also difficult not to compare the two conflicts when civilian casualties and displacement caused by NATO operations are systematically under-reported either for political reasons or for lack of access. Access can only be carved and negotiated if agencies engage in dialogue with all the parties to the conflict. In Afghanistan, like in Iraq, the UN as a whole has taken sides. And civilian victims pay for it.

It would of course be too easy to blame the UN for the role it plays in Afghanistan or in Iraq. The Security Council gave it a political mandate in both countries, and under the one UN framework, all agencies --- including the humanitarian ones --- operate under the same umbrella. One has to wonder, however, how the international community will recover from the loss of humanitarian values it has promoted by effectively making the UN a party to the conflict in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The damage is enormous and has even hurt independent, non-governmental agencies that are perceived as being more of the same by the local population. As for the United Nations, its reputation is shattered, some fear, for good.

Unfortunately for the UN and for Afghan civilians, Laura Bush did not take advantage of her visit to bring attention to the humanitarian challenges millions of returnees, displaced and ordinary civilians face. But perhaps next time, she will spend the night, visit a village or two, and decide to offer the American public a more balanced account of the reality in Afghanistan.

--Kristele Younes

Kristele Younes and Patrick Duplat are currently in Afghanistan assessing the needs of returning refugees and internally displaced people throughout the country.

United Nations: Security Council's Trip to Africa Highlights Needs

2008-06-04T17:17:00.001-04:00

Since 2000, Security Council members have taken a trip each year to Africa—to visit UN peacekeeping missions, to meet with heads of state, and to otherwise get a “real picture” of what is happening on the ground. Members will often visit camps to talk to refugees, internally displaced people and members of aid agencies who are providing services.

The United Nations is central to global efforts to solve problems that challenge humanity and promote international peace and security. However, more of China’s allies have rotated onto the Security Council this year, making the historical divisions within the Security Council more pronounced than ever before and weakening its authority. This makes it more difficult for the UN to take concrete action, and there are few expectations that this year’s mission to Sudan, Chad, Nairobi and Djibouti (for Somalia issues), the DR Congo and Ivory Coast will lead to anything concrete.

Expectations are particularly low in the case of Sudan, as the Security Council has been impotent when it comes to Sudan for quite some time now. The Sudanese government continues to put bureaucratic impediments to the deployment of UNAMID, the joint UN-AU peacekeeping force in Darfur and refuses to fulfill its previous agreements. Some Council members had indicated that the mission would be an opportunity to reinvigorate the Security Council’s response to Sudan and reverse the Sudanese government’s blatant disregard for their authority. But after many discussions before their mission, it appears that the Security Council is headed to Sudan without a clear plan or strategy.

With the Security Council unable to act, it becomes all the more essential that individual governments increase their financial support for UNAMID and for NGOs and UN agencies providing assistance on the ground. It is also necessary to continue pressuring Sudan to fulfill its agreements, and to urge Sudan’s allies to increase pressure on Sudan.

Some Security Council members were determined to travel to Mogadishu, but because of insecurity, particularly in light of the recent attempt on President Yusef’s life, they will go to Nairobi and Djibouti to discuss Somalia. As Refugees International wrote in a letter to Council members, there are no easy answers for Somalia, but the status quo is unacceptable. The humanitarian crisis in Somalia is catastrophic. Somalis are routinely subject to massive human rights violations by all parties. Because of insecurity, very few agencies are providing assistance, so Somalis are left to fend for themselves. The insecurity in Somalia is a threat to international peace and security, but the Security Council has yet to come up with a response that is commensurate with the severity of the crisis. Still, Refugees International urges the Council to approach the use of an external military or peacekeeping force with extreme caution and to deliver humanitarian assistance in an impartial manner.

DRC is another area of concern for Refugees International. While there has been some progress since elections, largely due to the good work of MONUC, there is still a risk that all of this progress will be quickly reversed. There are still 1.1 million people displaced by violence throughout the east, and there are still armed groups attacking civilians. The Congolese national army is still one of the largest perpetrators of human rights violations. Rwanda is still deeply involved in the conflict in the east. Despite these threats, MONUC, one of the largest and most expensive peacekeeping operations in the world, will be under pressure to downsize. RI is hopeful that the Security Council will see the necessity to renew MONUC at its current size and with its current mandate in order to preserve the gains that have been made.

--Michelle Brown

President's Corner: Praying for Ted Kennedy

2008-06-02T15:57:00.005-04:00

I first met Ted Kennedy on Oct. 26, 1963. His brother, President Kennedy, was at Amherst College, to receive an honorary degree and to break ground for the construction of the Robert Frost Library. Ted Kennedy arrived just as the convocation began. My job was to usher him to his seat.

Ted Kennedy had been elected to the Senate the year before when he was 30 years old. He looked as young as some of the students in the audience, but, of course, he was better dressed and escorted by a state policeman.

This flashback is on my mind as Sen. Kennedy undergoes surgery today to remove a malignant brain tumor.

In his speech at Amherst College that day President Kennedy said: “Privilege is here, and with privilege goes responsibility.” Ted Kennedy lives by that maxim. During his 46 years in the Senate, he has used his position of privilege and power to fight for the poor, the uninsured, the educationally disadvantaged, targets of racial or ethnic discrimination, immigrants, and refugees.

He was instrumental in passing the Refugee Act of 1980, which moved the country from an ad-hoc resettlement program to the current infrastructure—strong partnerships between the government and private resettlement agencies and clear annual goals.

In the last two years, he was worked tirelessly to expand resettlement opportunities for Iraqi refugees, particularly those who worked for the United States and had to flee the country to escape threats against their lives.

Last month, Albert R. Hunt wrote in his Bloomberg News commentary that “Edward M. Kennedy is the most gifted legislator, and one of the best politicians and most exuberant public servants I have know in my almost four decades of covering Washington and politics.”

I saw these qualities first hand last year as Sen. Kennedy worked to win passage of the Refugee Crisis in Iraq Act. He approached the issue of protecting Iraqis with knowledge and passion. He assembled a strong bipartisan coalition, working with Republican colleagues and the White House to get an acceptable bill. He instructed his smart, legislatively savvy staff to put together a coalition of civil society agencies and other support groups. He met repeatedly with people who could push the bill forward, and he thanked everybody when the bill was passed.

On this day, when Senator Kennedy is undergoing brain surgery, I give thanks for all he has done for the country and pray for his full recovery. We need his energy, and we need his commitment to justice.

--Ken Bacon