Focus Magazine , Issue 89 , Autumn 2011 .

FOCUS

ACTION FOR GLOBAL JUSTICE Issue 89 /Autumn 2011 ISSN 1649-7368

INSIDE Action - Africa Tell it Like it Is / Food Security in Sierra Leone / A view from South Africa on Climate Justice / Palestine and the Arab Spring / Somalia and the “Aura of Terrorism” / Persecution of Haiti’s Earthquake Survivors / Comhlámh News

{ Welcome } Credits & Contact details Focus magazine, established in 1978, now published three times a year, is Ireland’s leading magazine on global development issues. It is published by Comhlámh, Development Workers in Global Solidarity, Ireland, which works to promote global development through education and action. The views expressed in individual articles are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Comhlámh, Irish Aid or our other funders.

We have tried to contact all relevant photographers to seek their permission to use photographs. We apologise to those we have been unable to trace.

The publication of Focus Action is grant aided by the Development Education unit of Irish Aid Honorary Patron, Mary Robinson. © Copyright Comhlámh 2011 Correspondence Comhlámh, 2nd Floor, Ballast House Aston Quay, Dublin 2 Ph 01 4783490 E-mail: info@comhlamh.org

We Need You – Get Involved Focus is produced by an editorial collective of volunteers, with the support of the Comhlámh office in Dublin. New volunteers are always welcome. Please contact Comhlámh if you are interested in any aspect of the production of this magazine. No prior experience is necessary.

Code of Conduct on Images and Messages Comhlámh is signatory to the Dóchas Code of Conduct on Images and Messages (for full document see http:// www.comhlamh.org/resources-library. html or contact us for a copy of the Dóchas flyer). Feedback on this issue is most welcome – email: info@comhlamh.org

Editorial team Editorial Team: Fleachta Phelan, Hannah Hamilton, Lisa Wilson, Izzy Fox, Deirdre Kelly, Miren Maialen Samper, David Traynor, Cillian O’Kelly, Justin Frewen, Ali Leahy, Caroline Connolly, Philip Kilgannon, Alison O’Brien.

Photography: Garry Walsh, David Traynor - Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti Cover Image: The Africa Cente (John Murinye www.L2WDesign.com) Illustration: Alice Fitzgerald Design: Alice Fitzgerald (www.alicefitzgerald.com) Printed by Tralee Print www.traleeprinting.com Printed on recycled paper

The views expressed herein are those of Comhlámh and can in no way be taken to reflect the official opinion of Irish Aid.

Charity alone will never change the world

Join Comhlámh: take action for global justice In a world that seems so unfair, don't you wish that Ireland would stand up for justice? Yet there have been moments to be proud of when Ireland helped make a difference:   

against apartheid for the freedom of East Timor for debt cancellation

But these breakthroughs only happen because people - like you - demand change and make justice matter.

For 36 years, Comhlámh (Irish for 'solidarity' and pronounced 'co-law-ve') has been educating and campaiging for global justice in solidarity with the developing world.

Our members challenge the root causes of injustice and inequality - globally and locally.

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{ Focus Action }

Africa Tell It Like It Is

Reframing Images: Changing Messages and Perceptions The ‘Africa Tell It Like It Is’ posters were developed as part of a European project involving African organisations in the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland and Slovenia. The work aims to respond to the negative images and messages which some community groups, individuals, aid agencies and the media continue to use to portray Africa and African people in Europe. These images and messages create negative stereotypes of Africa and African people and have serious impacts on African people living in Europe. The use of colonial and charitable images and messages of Africa and Africans further perpetuate unequal relations between Europeans and Africans.

That is not to say that Africa doesn’t have its fair share of problems such as poverty, war and disease. However the aim of the campaign is to advocate that those are not representative of the entire continent. Africa, a continent made up of 55 very different countries, also experiences profound economic growth, strong leadership at an international level and great innovation at a local level.

The ‘Africa Tell It Like It Is’ campaign advocates that individuals, groups, fundraisers and the media simply portray Africa as it is. It also encourages us all to examine and explore:

• What Africa is doing for herself?

• W hat interdependency exists between the continents of Europe and Africa?

• Why not consider Africa as a place to do business?

It is a campaign that challenges all of us to question the stereotypes that have been created of Africa and tell it like it is!

What YOU can do: • Write to us to get some copies of our posters and display them in your home, workplace, or classroom - email info@africacentre.ie • Respond to media coverage that you feel does not portray Africa in a correct manner • Talk to Africans living in Ireland and ask them about their experience and perspectives about development issues.

• Debate and discuss the portrayal of Africa and Africans in Ireland with your friends, families, work colleagues etc and challenge stereotypes that come up • Check out Africa Centre website for reports, books and DVDs, or come along to one of our events. See www.africacentre.ie • Learn more about the history of Africa, and issues which impact deeply on poverty in the continent, such as aid, trade, debt, tax evasion, climate change and others.

Bloom is:

Focus { 3 }

{ Focus Action } Aim:

What is needed:

The campaign aims to address the issue of equality between people, countries and continents.

• Recognition by individuals that Africa is a continent made up of 55 different and diverse countries • Promotion of the Dóchas Code of Conduct on Images and Messages among community groups, individuals, aid agencies and the media. For example ‘‘choose images and related messages based on the values of respect, equality, solidarity and justice” and “avoid images and messages that potentially stereotype, sensationalise or discriminate’’.

• A deeper understanding about, and analysis of, the causes of poverty in countries in Africa, including the role that some areas of European policy have in maintaining poverty in Africa.

• An understanding of how much Europe benefits from, and depends on, Africa (for example for tea, and mobile phones!)

Objectives: • To raise awareness on development issues in the European Union from an African perspective through the development and promotion of positive images of Africans and African countries • To build the capacity of African people living in Ireland, Northern Ireland and Slovenia to deliver development education programmes focused on positive images of Africans and African Countries.

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Food Security in Sierra Leone David Traynor describes the attempts of Sierra Leone to strengthen and develop its agricultural sector while protecting the environment.

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ierra Leone has faced many challenges since its emergence from a decade of civil war in 2002. In particular returning displaced peoples faced the daunting task of rebuilding their livelihoods. This included rehabilitating their farms, rice fields and livestock numbers. With a growing awareness of the need to protect all aspects of the environment, from soil and water to ecosystems and biodiversity, the question remains: how can Sierra Leone continue to build on recent successes in livelihoods programmes and projects and ensure their sustainability?

Before the conflict, Sierra Leone led the way in Africa for agricultural research. Since the end of the civil war the government (and in particular the current Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Food Security, Dr. J. Sam Sesay) has recognised the potential for Sierra Leone’s agricultural sector. This potential includes vast areas of available land and the large portion of Sierra Leoneans working in agriculture. The government has championed this commercialisation of agricultural policy through the Smallholder Commercialisation Programme. This involves moving small farmers from producing enough food for their household to running their farms as a business, and aims to increase both food self-sufficiency and incomes for the most vulnerable. All NGOs and other agencies assisting in the rehabilition of the country’s agricultural sector and ensuring food security must align their programmes to this policy.

However, as we have seen in many other countries including Ireland, without the right checks and balances, commercialising agriculture can lead to terrible impacts on the environment and can threaten food sustainability and security, especially in vulnerable regions. This can be through overuse of land depleting the fertility of the soil, deforestation for farming and agricultural pollution.

When threats to the environment are coupled with climate change, unseasonal weather patterns and other factors such as conflict, it becomes ever more critical.

Sierra Leone is renowned globally for its rice production. Indeed, it is said that a Sierra Leonean has not eaten until they have had their fill of rice. The agricultural rehabilitation programmes throughout the countryside focus on converting the Inland Valley Swamps for rice cultivation. Historically these wetlands have proved a valuable land asset with fertile soils and water availability. During the conflict they were abandoned to nature as people fled, but the last 10 years have seen them coming back into use.

Farmer Field Schools, centres established and run by either the government or NGOs, are training farmers to high standards of rice growing. These include water control, drainage, plotting rice paddies and nutrient management. Farmers have also learned to grow other crops in the dry season. Such schemes have culminated in a reduction of lean periods of food availability from four to two months, thereby reducing reliance on imported food during these months. What’s more, these newly-trained farmers have passed on their knowledge to

{ Food Security }

Rice growing on inland valley swamps, Tonkolili District, Sierra Leone.

Photo: David Traynor.

other communities.

However, some problems with new methods have arisen: draining swamps to prepare the soil for planting exposes the decaying plant matter to air, oxidising the iron it contains and harming crops.

Farmers have adapted to this by flushing the rice paddies with water to wash this iron out, but this could have further implications for pollution of water courses. Other major issues include the threat of deforestation for forest ecosystems near expanding agricultural areas, reductions in soil fertility caused by continuous cropping and habitat loss for the many species who called these swamps home.

Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) is now the major talk of the majority of humanitarian and development organisations, and most are mainstreaming it into their programmes. DRR involves planning prevention measures with communities to reduce the risk and cope with disasters. The way in which it integrates with environmental management is key to DRR’s effectiveness in the developing world.

Protecting forests, soils, wetlands and wildlife where these rice cultivation programmes are implemented has myriad benefits beyond carbon sinks and species protection. Properly managed land is more resilient to the flood/drought pendulum of climate change that causes soil erosion, landslides and flash flooding, as well as to the ‘high yield’ pressures of commercial agriculture, making it fundamental to the security and sustainability of food production in rural areas.

So how can a balance be achieved to ensure Sierra Leone and other countries vulnerable to food insecurity can protect the environment while feeding themselves and increasing their incomes, both now and in the future? A big part of the answer, as is often the case, is education: already the foundations for environmental awareness have been laid through Primary School Green Clubs that have been established throughout Sierra Leone and West Africa. These clubs foster environmental awareness and teach valuable crop growing skills to equip the next generation with the knowledge they’ll need for a food-secure future. Perhaps we can also look at other examples throughout the world where farming and conservation go hand in hand to see what can be learned.

For background on the government’s agricultural policy: Government of Sierra Leone: National Sustainable Agriculture Development Plan 2010-2030 (found on Food and Agricultural Organisation’s website) Disaster Risk Reduction in relation to the environment: Prevention Web : http://preventionweb.net/english/themes/ environment/ Rice cultivation and wetlands can be found on: Wetland Action: http://www.wetlandaction.org/ Wetlands International: http://www.wetlands.org/

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Climate Justice

{ Climate Justice }

A view from the grassroots movement in Durban, South Africa, on climate justice and the forthcoming UN meeting on climate change this December.

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n December this year, a global meeting – COP 17 – will take place in Durban, South Africa. Its goal is to negotiate an international agreement on climate change to replace the Kyoto Protocol, and comes in the wake of the failed summits at Copenhagen and Cancun. In Durban across Africa and the world, the Climate Justice Movement has been preparing. Here, we print an abridged version of the local mobilisation leaflet to give you an inside view of the challenges faced on the ground in South Africa, and the reasons why – despite low expectations – a positive outcome is so urgently needed.

Why we question COP 17 “The Climate Justice Movement in Durban is trying to ensure the Conference of the Parties (COP) 17 isn’t simply another failed, elite summit-hop. But our expectations are low. Why? We anticipate that the Kyoto Protocol’s binding commitments to reduce carbon will be trashed and replaced by Washington’s ‘pledge and review’ voluntary commitments; the so-called Green Climate Fund will be captured by private for-profit interests; carbon trading will be heavily promoted, even though it is failing in practice; and urgent emissions cuts – 50% by 2017, as science requires – will be scoffed at.

Sixteen years of talk by procrastinating, paralysed UN Framework Convention on Climate Change negotiators, guided by fossil fuel-addicted big business, have left us no strategy to save the planet.

South Africa’s energy and climate policies are set by the corporate Minerals-Energy Complex. South Africa’s alreadyvast CO2 emissions will soar, with the world’s third and fourth largest coal-fired power stations now under construction. Who wins? Eskom [South Africa’s large public electricity company] still supplies the world’s cheapest electricity to the world’s biggest mining and metals houses – BHP Billiton and Anglo American – which in turn permanently degrade water resources and pollute the air. Opportunities for climate jobs and renewable energy are practically ignored. Meanwhile, power disconnections affect millions of low-income people each year as a result of a 130% electricity price increase since 2008, making it unaffordable and inaccessible to the poor, who are returning to dirty paraffin, coal and firewood. And in 2009 President Jacob Zuma was one of the five ‘leaders’ who, led by the US White House, signed the nonbinding Copenhagen Accord, leaving Africa to fry.

We have been disappointed before. Previously we demonstrated to voice our concerns about the process and outcomes in Durban of the UN World Conference against Racism in 2001, and in 2002 30,000 people marched in Johannesburg at the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development.

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“Our survival relies upon adoption of transformative policies and laws that respect natural systems.”

Our traditions of fighting social and climate injustice Durban has a long history of mobilising for social, economic and climate justice. From resistance to British settlers, the development of satyagraha by Mahatma Gandhi to antiapartheid campaigns and trade union movements. More recently urban social movements of shackdwellers have developed, as well as activism on AIDs denialism and the Treatment Action Campaign on access to medicines which celebrated victory over the WTO. The spirit of climate justice is growing in Durban. The movement began in 2004 when the international Durban Group for Climate Justice research/advocacy network was founded, continuing today as a source of critical information about ‘false solutions’. A high-profile fight against South Africa’s first ‘Clean Development Mechanism’ carbon trading project was waged at Durban’s environmentally-racist Bisasar Road landfill – Africa’s largest – in the mid-2000s, resulting in a World Bank retreat from project financing in 2005 (though community leader Sajida Khan died of cancer in 2007, after which the city sold European firms the rights to pollute in exchange for methane-to-electricity emissions reduction credits).

In 2009, a major climate summit was hosted by the activist group, South Durban Community Environmental Alliance (SDCEA). The same group later organised the first protests against the World Bank’s funding of the Medupi coal-fired power plant with its biggest-ever project loan ($3.75 billion) in April 2010. Protests continue in South Durban, one of the world’s most dangerous petro-chemical sites, including being one of the sites of 1,000 global protests in December 2010 in solidarity with those in Cancun.

The other main South African cities also host regular protests on climate, energy and related issues. In December 2010, there were 14 arrests at an Earthlife Africa Jo’burg protest against the state’s energy policy. Regular demonstrations are held at Eskom and Sasol, South Africa’s two largest CO2 emitters, and South African activists founded Climate Justice Now! SA in 2009. On December 3 this year, the Global Day of Action, we will march past the US Consulate, City Hall and ICC [where the COP meeting takes place], to a ‘going away party for the beach.’

The area in Durban, South Africa, where the COP 17 meeting will take place. Photo Garry Walshe.

We resist, with your solidarity Climate activists across the world are putting bodies on the line with civil disobedience, while campaigns to leave fossil fuels in the ground and halt fracking are intensifying. The Durban Climate Justice community welcomes local and international friends to visit, to understand and amplify our mutual struggles: consulates and corporations will be warned not to make the COP a Conference of Polluters.

With Latin American indigenous activists from the Andes teaching us about buen vivir (living well) and pachamama (Mother Earth), we know our survival relies upon adoption of transformative policies and laws that respect natural systems.

These must also stimulate green, local, innovative, resilient, sustainable, job-rich political economies, at a time when the fossildependent, consumer-centric, financially-chaotic, ecologicallyinsensitive, capitalist economic model has reached dead-end.

Join us in Durban, where more than 300 toxic, high-polluting, extraction-based industrial plants are destroying the health of residents and all life, and also contributing 45% of our city’s greenhouse gases. These hangovers of apartheid’s tight relationship between state and capital need urgent transformation. Our demands are clear: to replace fossil fuels with renewables, to sustainably use and preserve water drawn from natural cycles, to breathe clean air untainted by toxins, carcinogens and particulates, to live in a climate unaltered by fossil fuel emissions, and the recognition of fundamental rights for our natural communities and ecosystems.”

What is ‘Climate Justice’?

Principles and demands articulated at Rights of Mother Earth Conference Cochabamba, Bolivia, April 2010 • 50 percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2017 • stabilising temperature rises to 1C and 300 Parts Per Million • acknowledging the climate debt owed by developed countries, 6% of GDP • full respect for Human Rights and the inherent rights of indigenous people • universal declaration of rights of Mother Earth to ensure harmony with nature • establishment of an International Court of Climate Justice • rejection of carbon markets and commodification of nature & forests through REDD

For more information, and to read the full version of this text, check out:

• change the consumption patterns of wealthy countries

www.sdcea.co.za ccs.ukzn.ac.za www.groundwork.org.za

• end intellectual property rights for technologies

Focus { 7 }

{ Palestine }

Israel, Palestine and the Arab Spring

The recent popular revolutions across North Africa and the Middle East have changed the political dynamics of the region. Stephen McCloskey wonders what impact this will have on Israel-Palestine relations. he Arab Spring has captured the world’s imagination “The outbreak of the Arab Spring in following the wave of popular demonstrations and protests that have challenged the authoritarian order of the Middle East and North Africa is several states in North Africa and the Middle East. These rebellions have created new possibilities for genuinely participative re-aligning international relations and open governance in societies previously characterised by in the region and creating fresh repression and the subjugation of cultural, gender and other key human rights. But can the Arab Spring help unlock the seemingly optimism in Palestine that it may intractable conflict between Israel and Palestine and hasten an end to the Israeli blockade of Gaza? positively impact on people’s lives.”

Since 2007, the Israeli blockade has restricted to a trickle the

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flow of food, medicines and humanitarian resources entering Gaza.

Israel claims the blockade is needed to stem the launch of missiles from Gaza into its territory, but the United Nations has condemned the siege as an act of ‘collective punishment’ which breaches Israel’s legal responsibilities as the occupying power in the territory. Under the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israel is “duty bound” to “meet the humanitarian needs of the population of the Gaza Strip without qualification”.

This legal obligation was most callously breached on 27 December 2008 when Israel launched a ferocious aerial and ground attack on Gaza, leaving 1,419 Palestinians dead by 18 January 2009. Of the victims of Israel’s ‘Operation Cast Lead’, 82% were civilians, including 318 children and 111 women. A subsequent UN enquiry found that the Israeli bombardment included “deliberate attacks on civilian objects in violation of the rule of customary international humanitarian law whereby attacks must be strictly limited to military objectives”.

Gaza was targeted by armaments that included white phosphorous: an incendiary weapon that according to Amnesty International “burns deeply through muscle and into the bone, continuing to burn until deprived of oxygen”. Amnesty International describes white phosphorous as a weapon used to provide a smokescreen for troop movements and considered its use in highly populated neighbourhoods in Gaza as a “war crime”. Israeli forces’ use of flechette shells – shells that explode in the air and disperse metal fragments over a diameter up to 250 metres – contributed to Gaza’s 5,300 wounded. During the offensive, 15 of Gaza’s 27 hospitals, 43 of its 110 primary healthcare centres and 29 of its 148 ambulances were either damaged or completely destroyed.

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Because of the ongoing blockade of Gaza, the Palestinian people have been denied the right to rebuild the 3,000 homes destroyed and 20,000 damaged by the bombardment. Cement and other building materials are included in the list of items not admitted into the territory.

Describing the situation, United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) spokesman Christopher Gunness declared, “You could say that Israel has bombed Gaza back into the mud age because that’s what they’re building their houses out of now – mud”.

The collapse of successive diplomatic Middle East peace initiatives and the 2006 rupture in relations between the dominant Palestinian political groups, Fatah and Hamas, seem to have closed the door on any kind of diplomatic settlement in the region. Western powers played fast and loose with Palestinian democracy by refusing to accept the outcome of the 2006 parliamentary election clearly won by Hamas. This resulted in an internal conflict and the takeover of Gaza by Hamas, who have been shut out of peace negotiations by the US and Israel. The Obama administration was humiliated last November by Israel’s refusal to halt the building of settlements for 90 days in return for 20 F-35 fighter jets and additional incentives worth US$3billion. The subsequent resignation of the US Peace Envoy to the Middle East, George Mitchell, in May 2011 after two years of diplomacy showed that the Middle East peace process is going nowhere.

It is difficult to find grounds for optimism in such a bleak diplomatic scenario with poverty levels worsening day by day on the ground. For example, a recent UNRWA report found that unemployment levels in Gaza are among the highest in the world at 45.2%. However, the outbreak of the Arab Spring in the Middle East

{ Palestine }

Destruction from the Israeli invasion in 2008/9 is evident all over Gaza city. Rebuilding is painstakingly slow, given the short supply of vital materials such as cement, due to the economic blockade imposed by Israel. Gaza city, March 2011. Photo: Gary Walsh.

and North Africa is re-aligning international relations in the region and creating fresh optimism in Palestine that it may positively impact on people’s lives.

The Arab Rebellion has already forced both Fatah and Hamas to re-assess their position within Palestine and internationally, resulting in a Cairo-brokered agreement between the two parties that includes an electoral pact. Hamas may have been motivated in part by the weakening position of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, a key ally in the region, with the party headquartered in Damascus. Also, the emergence of Egypt’s interim administration as a more even-handed and trusted negotiator (a relationship not enjoyed under President Mubarak) created a more reliable means of communication between Hamas and Fatah.

For its part, Fatah may have seized the Cairo agreement as a means of bolstering its flagging popularity in Palestine after a WikiLeaks cable released in December 2010 revealed that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and the Fatah movement had “established a very good working relationship” with the Israeli Security Agency in 2007 following the Hamas takeover of Gaza. This revelation will have angered many of Fatah’s core supporters given the level of Israeli oppression across the Occupied Territories. There is also a rising level of frustration within Palestinian civil society at the political stalemate in the territory at a time of rapid change in neighbouring states.

The Arab Rebellion has already led to a conditional re-opening

by Egypt of its southern Rafah crossing into Gaza and appears to have inspired a renewed assertiveness among the political actors in Palestine itself with the call for UN recognition of Palestinian statehood on 23 September 2011. The Palestinian Authority has grown exasperated with Israel’s refusal to cease the construction of settlements in the West Bank while the US maintains what the Guardian describes as the “partisanship” of its administration in standing “foursquare” behind Israel.

While the move for statehood in itself will not address the underlying causes of conflict, it is reflective of a growing sense of agency and political awakening sweeping across the region on the back of the Arab Spring. Israel and the US are finding themselves increasingly isolated in the region as key players like Egypt and Turkey are growing frustrated and angry at Israel’s continued blockade of Gaza and forestalling of meaningful negotiations with Palestine.

Diplomatic relations in the region would undoubtedly be strengthened by an immediate lifting of the Israeli blockade of Gaza which B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights organisation, believes has “destroyed Gaza’s economy”. 70% of Gazans currently live on less than a dollar a day. Despite the poverty resulting from the occupation, a recent poll has shown that there is “a cautious optimism” among a slight majority of Palestinians regarding the building of the Palestinian economy following the recent rapprochement between Fatah and Hamas. The history of this region is littered with false dawns and agreements that have turned to dust, but the Arab Rebellion offers the real prospect of a more united Palestine and a hastening of the end to the siege of Gaza.

Stephen McCloskey is the Director of the Centre for Global Education in Belfast, a development non-governmental organisation and has recently returned from a visit to Gaza.

For more information visit: B’Tselem - The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories http://www.btselem.org Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign http://www.ipsc.ie Palestinian Center for Human Rights http://www.pchrgaza.org/ portal/en/ Sadaka: The Ireland Palestine Solidarity Alliance for Palestinian Justice http://www.sadaka.ie

Focus { 9 }

Somalia and the “Aura of Terrorism”

{ Famine and Aid }

Izzy Fox explores the dynamics of delivering aid to the Horn of Africa in the midst of the current food crisis.

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he ongoing crisis in the Horn of Africa is one of the worst disasters to occur in the region in at least ten years. In spite of the magnitude of the situation, the relief effort has, thus far, only been 44% funded, meaning an additional US$1.4 billion is still needed to help alleviate the immediate crisis at hand.

Famine has been declared in five regions of Somalia, and it is spreading. Somalia is at the epicentre of the emergency, but the food crisis is a regional problem. Neighbouring Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti are also at risk. At least 12.4 million people in the region are in need of assistance, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

The reasons for the gulf between what has been donated to date and the amount still required in monetary assistance are multifaceted and complex. Security concerns, infrastructural and ongoing climactic problems, misinformation, donor fatigue and the scale of the problem are all likely factors contributing to the slow response of individual and multilateral donors.

The very real obstacles to providing effective aid should not be underestimated, which is why many organisations, including Comhlámh, advise against well-meaning but ill-equipped and untrained volunteers going to the region. These challenges, however, should not, as Ian Bray (Senior Press Officer of Oxfam UK) points out, result in a situation where “aid is being driven by particular foreign policies or by security concerns”. Bray believes that the way in which the international community responds to disasters of this type needs a “radical shake-up”, and that priority should be given first and foremost to those most at risk. African and international aid organisations are working within the region, but their efforts are hampered by the restrictions placed on them by Al Shabaab, the Islamist group which controls much of the worst affected area of southern Somalia.

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“Some countries and communities are increasingly dubious about the perceived political nature of aid.”

With the current situation in Somalia, ongoing concern and debate around the role of, and motivation behind, aid is becoming real. Some countries and communities are increasingly dubious about the perceived political nature of aid. Al Shabaab is unwilling to accept aid from “Christian” charities and is suspicious of the influx of foreign aid organisations into its stronghold in the south of the country. The instability in the region and the danger of violence has been a major cause of the reluctance of the international community, particularly the US, to send adequate aid. The US has added a caveat to what they have pledged, stating that aid agencies receiving state donations must ensure that the chance of Al Shabaab (who have links to Al-Qaeda) benefiting from this aid is reduced.

The danger is that these concerns have already resulted in, and will continue to cause, a hiatus in the global response to the crisis and a fall-off of donors. This is critical because, as foreign governments dither, the people most at risk suffer the most. A famine has multiple causes, which could include prolonged periods of drought, conflict, corruption, underinvestment in agriculture, overdependence on certain crops, inequitable distribution and profiteering on food items and unfair trade rules. Famines are never simply attributable to a one-off drought or crop failure alone. Consequently, there is never going to be an ideal environment in which aid can be provided in countries affected by famine. The international community needs to be informed, flexible, creative and prepared in order to prove effective in dealing with such crises in the future.

{ Famine and Aid }

Criteria for declaration of famine  20% of households in an area face extreme food shortages  Acute malnutrition rates exceed 30%  The death rate exceeds two persons per day per 10,000 When terms like “terrorism” and “Al-Qaeda” are bandied about in the media they arouse suspicion and fear. Although Al Shabaab poses a real threat to the aid effort on the ground, its capacity to jeorpardise the work of aid agencies on a large scale and intercept funds has arguably been overstated. Many aid organisations are working effectively within the region and are not calling for donations to be frozen. Mary Robinson, following her trip to Somalia, stated that the country suffers from an “aura of terrorism”.

She pointed out that Al Shabaab is not a “monolith” and that there are moderate forces within it. This is contrary to the way in which the group has been presented by much of the international media.

I am not an advocate for Al Shabaab, but Robinson’s point highlights the dangers of lazy journalism and ignorance in tarring the whole organisation with the brush of terrorism. This, according to Robinson, is not what aid agencies want. Once the “terrorism” word is used, lethargy posing as caution can be presented as a justifiable excuse to hold back aid.

The strict neutrality policy adopted by the International Committee of The Red Cross (ICRC) could provide a model for working effectively in what are otherwise virtually impenetrable conflict zones. ICRC’s system of Operational Cooperation, whereby their operational resources are pooled with that country’s national branch, means that the most vulnerable people can be reached.

Donor hesitancy could also be attributed to scare-mongering

tactics, when Al Shabaab and international terrorism are mentioned in the same breath. Peter King, a US congressman, may well have inadvertently exacerbated the situation in East Africa with his ill-informed comments, when he claimed that Americans defecting to Al Shabaab’s insurgence against Somalia’s UN-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG) posed a “growing threat to our homeland”. Karen Greenberg of the Guardian newspaper points out that King has been criticised for “…his reckless use of Congress to articulate fear and distrust of Muslims”. She also states that King’s claims are rife with inaccuracies.

Greenberg has found that foreign individuals who join Al Shabaab’s insurrection are usually of Somali descent and are not motivated by an international jihad. They are in fact supporting local communities in a weakened society against what they see as an ineffectual government in a country where drought and violence prevail.

Failure by the international community to familiarise themselves with the nuances and complexities within the organisation and learn to work with, and around, Al Shabaab, is costing lives on a daily basis in the Horn of Africa. What is needed now, according to Mary Robinson, is an urgent and sustained multi-sectoral approach to aid in order to provide immediate assistance to those at the greatest risk of starvation in the shortterm. It is also essential to ensure that support continues beyond the initial crisis, so that the cycle of famine in the region is broken and the root causes are addressed.

For more information check out the following links: http://www.howyoucanhelp.ie http://www.icrc.org/ http://www.unocha.org/

Focus { 11 }

{ Haiti }

Persecutionof Haiti’s Earthquake Survivors

The survivors of the earthquake in Haiti have faced many challenges since January 2010. Justin Frewen highlights the ill-treatment and displacement of many who are still living in tents, almost two years later.

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n the 12th of January 2010, an earthquake struck 10 miles to the southwest of Haiti’s capital Port-au-Prince.

The death toll from the quake was enormous: 220,000 people were killed and over 300,000 injured. According to the Haitian government, 250,000 homes were destroyed leaving around 1.5 million people homeless.

However, Haiti’s problems started long before the earthquake.

As Yves Engler explains: “Technically “independent” for more than two centuries, outsiders have long shaped the country’s affairs.

Through isolation, economic asphyxiation, debt dependence, gunboat diplomacy, occupation, foreign supported dictatorships, structural adjustment programs and “democracy promotion,” Haiti is no stranger to the various forms of foreign political manipulation.”

In 1825, two decades after the slaves of Haiti had wrested their freedom from their former colonial masters, France coerced the newly autonomous state into agreeing to pay 150 million francs (equivalent to €15 billion today) as compensation for its lost chattel or human slaves. A century later, the US State Department-National City Bank of NY (Citibank) purchased Haiti’s only commercial bank and national treasury. To protect this investment, President Woodrow Wilson sent US troops to occupy Haiti in 1915, where they remained until 1934 while US bankers appropriated 40% of Haiti’s GDP. In 1991, the democratically elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, whose programme included implementing land reforms, providing assistance to peasants and increasing wages and union rights, was removed in a US-backed coup. Although US President Clinton facilitated his return to the Presidency in 1994, he was obliged to commit to implementing a neoliberal economic programme, known locally as the “plan of death”. Although Aristide refused elements of the US plan, its implementation undermined his own programme of reforms. Given such external meddling in its internal affairs, it is hardly surprising that even prior to the 2010 earthquake Haiti was the most impoverished country in the Western Hemisphere.

The ongoing political interference by international powers has

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“The ongoing political interference by international powers has also gravely enfeebled Haiti’s political system, leaving it dominated by an elite that caters for the interests of wealthy and powerful local and international actors, to the detriment of the average Haitian” also gravely enfeebled Haiti’s political system, leaving it dominated by an elite that caters for the interests of wealthy and powerful local and international actors, to the detriment of the average Haitian.

The callous treatment of hundreds of thousands of Haitians forced to relocate and seek shelter in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake is a case in point.

Many of these internally displaced persons (IDPs), having lost most of their possessions, now live in tent cities where they frequently fail to receive standard public services such as free, potable water. This situation has aggravated the impact of a serious cholera epidemic that affected an estimated 420,000 Haitians, resulting in over 6,000 fatalities.

Women, children and the elderly are particularly at risk of violence in these camps due to the absence of proper management and security. As one IDP, Malya Villard-Appolon, testified to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva in June 2010: “I live in a camp – in a tent in a camp – and I am a witness of the violence against women and girls who live in the camp all around me and I’m also a witness to the government’s response, a response which is entirely insufficient.”

Indeed, the priority of the Haitian authorities would appear to be the eviction of camp residents in order to make the land available for commercial exploitation. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) over 125,000 people

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Residents at the Internal Displacement Camp Barbancourt, Haiti make preparations for the arrival of Hurricane Tomas, October 2010. Photo: IJDH.

are confronted with the daily threat of forced eviction.

These forced evictions have often been violent. One camp was demolished with a bulldozer by state officials who actively prevented residents from gathering up their few belongings. Camps residents have also been shot with rubber bullets during evictions.

The evictions have continued despite the November 2010 issuance of precautionary measures by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) – an autonomous body of the Organization of American States that works to protect and promote human rights – ordering a moratorium on evictions and a range of other measures to protect those made homeless by the earthquake.

In response to the Haitian government’s non-compliance, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti (IJDH), the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI), You.Me.We. and TransAfrica Forum filed a joint petition to the IACHR to take further action. “The Government of Haiti (GOH) does not appear to have adopted or implemented the Commission’s recommendations... To the contrary, the GOH continues to execute a pattern of forced evictions, on both public and private land, and to participate in or fail to prevent evictions by private individuals.”

The petition requests the Commission to urge the Haitian government to strengthen its public housing agency. As Jeena Shah, a BAI attorney explains: “The Haitian government can best protect displaced persons from forced evictions by facilitating their access to adequate and affordable housing.”

At grassroots level, camp residents have held several demonstrations both in individual camps and jointly to protest against their treatment. The BAI has also worked together with

local organisations including Bri Kouri Nouvèl Gaye, Batay Ouvriye, Inivesite Popile, and Asanble Vwazen Solino and the coalition against forced evictions, the Inisyativ Rezistans Kont Ekspilsyon Fòse, holding a press conference to denounce the involvement of the Mayor of Delmas, a commune of Port-auPrince, in actively supporting these illegal evictions. A protest against evictions was also organised to coincide with the filing of a complaint against the mayor with Haiti’s National Prosecutor.

It is imperative that pressure is brought to bear on the government of Haiti and local authorities as well as international donors, the UN and the international community to prevent further forced evictions and ensure the provision of suitable housing to camp residents. Most importantly of all, if Haiti is to have the opportunity to rebuild itself, its national sovereignty must be genuinely respected.

For further information on the situation on the ground or how you might become involved in protecting the rights of the most vulnerable people in Haiti, visit the IJDH website at http://ijdh. org/ and BAI at http://ijdh.org/about/bai.

See also: Engler, Yves (2009) Haiti’s Harsh Realities. Counterpunch. http:// www.counterpunch.org/engler02272009.html MADRE (2010) Partner from Haiti Testifies Before the UN Human Rights Council. Madre. http://www.madre.org/index/ press-room-4/news/madre-partner-from-haiti-testifies-beforethe-un-human-rights-council-403.html

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Raw Materials Raw Deal Campaign Update Over 900 people, from 30 countries call on Europe to stop its resource grab.

During the months of August and September this year we ran an EU wide e-action targeting the European Commission’s Public Consultation on the topic of Trade and Development. The e-action highlighted concerns on the issue of trade and raw materials, and called on the EU to develop a trade policy that enables developing countries to benefit from their natural resources, and respects environmental, human rights and labour standards. Over 900 people, from 30 countries across 6 continents, including Zambia, the Philippines, Ecuador, Kenya, Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as Ireland, Britain, France and Germany, emailed the European Commission. They stated their concern that Europe’s current trade policy is disastrous for development, people living in poverty, and for the environment. It’s quite unusual for that many people to respond to an EU consultation, so your voices will have been heard, we made a significant impact.

the EU’s damaging resource grab, breaking the promise they made in 2009 that they would stand up for trade justice. You can read the text of the debate here - http:// www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP// TEXT+CRE+20110912+ITEM-021+DOC+XML+V0// EN&language=EN This is disappointing, but there is still hope. We will be following up with MEPs and encouraging you to do the same over the coming months and years to remind them that we care about trade justice and we will not be going away!

Do watch the webpage below for more opportunities to join our campaigns and take action to speak out for trade justice and against the EU’s new resource grab.

Trade Justice Group member Stephen Burns sends a postcard to his MEPs. Stephanie Reimer campaigning for Trade Justice at the Castle Palooza festival, July 2011.

Unfortunately our Irish MEPs let us down. They failed to keep the promises they made in 2009 to stand up for trade justice.

In a campaign that saw thousands of Irish citizens writing to their MEPs through campaign postcards, Comhlámh along with other trade justice groups across Europe, had warned that the EU’s new trade strategy on raw materials will undermine development and increase poverty levels in developing countries. But when the opportunity arose for our MEPs to keep their pledge to stand up for trade justice, the two Irish MEPs (Mairead McGuinness & Seán Kelly) who spoke at the debate in the European Parliament actually took a decidedly anti-trade justice stance, arguing in favour of corporate interests over the welfare of the world’s poor. So on September 12th 2011, Irish MEPs endorsed

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Comhlámh’s First Wednesday Debates

Keep the first Wednesday evening of every month free so you can come along to our famous first Wednesday Debates.

Drop in and hear important global justice and development questions being debated by engaging speakers. Have a listen, discuss with others, and ask questions, all in the laid back atmosphere of the Bewley’s Café Theatre. The debates are always lively and fun. Keep an eye on our website for the latest info on speakers and topics, or email debates@ comhlamh.org. http://www.comhlamh.org/bewleys-debates-are-back.html

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Celebrate International Volunteer Day – 5 December

5 December 2011 is International Volunteer Day and to celebrate Comhlámh will be launching the UN report on the State of World Volunteerism at the Mansion House in Dublin. The celebrations will begin at 3 p.m. There will be light refreshments, music and lively conversation. We would love to see you there!

For more info contact volops@comhlamh.org

‘Tis the Season to be Jolly Comhlámh Members and Supporters

Christmas Party Fri 16th Dec 7pm ‘til late

@ the Izakaya, downstairs at the Yamamori Oriental Café, 12/13 South Great Georges St, Dublin 2 Join us for a great night, dance and be merry until late With DJ Nigel Wood Comhlámh campaigners at Castle Palooza festival, July 2011.

Contact keelin@comhlamh.org for more info or call 01 478 3490

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Interested in volunteering in a developing country?

Working for a Better World: a Guide to Volunteering in Overseas Development Available in shops now!

You can also order copies from the Volunteering Options website www.volunteeringoptions.org