organization:red cross

  • The woman fighting back against India’s rape culture

    When a man tried to rape #Usha_Vishwakarma she decided to fight back by setting up self-defence classes for women and girls.

    At first, people accused her of being a sex worker. But now she runs an award-winning organisation and has won the community’s respect.

    https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-48474708/the-woman-fighting-back-against-india-s-rape-culture
    #Inde #résistance #femmes #culture_du_viol

    • In China, a Viral Video Sets Off a Challenge to Rape Culture

      The images were meant to exonerate #Richard_Liu, the e-commerce mogul. They have also helped fuel a nascent #NoPerfectVictim movement.

      Richard Liu, the Chinese e-commerce billionaire, walked into an apartment building around 10 p.m., a young woman on his arm and his assistant in tow. Leaving the assistant behind, the young woman took Mr. Liu to an elevator. Then, she showed him into her apartment.

      His entrance was captured by the apartment building’s surveillance cameras and wound up on the Chinese internet. Titled “Proof of a Gold Digger Trap?,” the heavily edited video aimed to show that the young woman was inviting him up for sex — and that he was therefore innocent of her rape allegations against him.

      For many people in China, it worked. Online public opinion quickly dismissed her allegations. In a country where discussion of rape has been muted and the #MeToo movement has been held back by cultural mores and government censorship, that could have been the end of the story.

      But some in China have pushed back. Using hashtags like #NoPerfectVictim, they are questioning widely held ideas about rape culture and consent.

      The video has become part of that debate, which some feminism scholars believe is a first for the country. The government has clamped down on discussion of gender issues like the #MeToo movement because of its distrust of independent social movements. Officials banned the #MeToo hashtag last year. In 2015, they seized gender rights activists known as the Feminist Five. Some online petitions supporting Mr. Liu’s accuser were deleted.

      But on Weibo, the popular Chinese social media service, the #NoPerfectVictim hashtag has drawn more than 17 million page views, with over 22,000 posts and comments. Dozens at least have shared their stories of sexual assault.

      “Nobody should ask an individual to be perfect,” wrote Zhou Xiaoxuan, who has become the face of China’s #MeToo movement after she sued a famous TV anchor on allegations that he sexually assaulted her in 2014 when she was an intern. “But the public is asking this of the victims of sexual assault, who happen to be in the least favorable position to prove their tragedies.” Her lawsuit is pending.

      The allegations against Mr. Liu, the founder and chairman of the online retailer JD.com, riveted China. He was arrested last year in Minneapolis after the young woman accused him of raping her after a business dinner. The prosecutors in Minnesota declined to charge Mr. Liu. The woman, Liu Jingyao, a 21-year-old student at the University of Minnesota, sued Mr. Liu and is seeking damages of more than $50,000. (Liu is a common surname in China.)

      Debate about the incident has raged online in China. When the “Gold Digger” video emerged, it shifted sentiment toward Mr. Liu.
      Editors’ Picks
      Preparing My Family for Life Without Me
      Naomi Wolf’s Career of Blunders Continues in ‘Outrages’
      The Man Who Told America the Truth About D-Day

      Mr. Liu’s attorney in Beijing, who shared the video on Weibo under her verified account, said that according to her client the video was authentic.

      “The surveillance video speaks for itself, as does the prosecutor’s decision not to bring charges against our client,” Jill Brisbois, Mr. Liu’s attorney in the United States, said in a statement. “We believe in his innocence, which is firmly supported by all of the evidence, and we will continue to vigorously defend his reputation in court.”

      The video is silent, but subtitles make the point so nobody will miss it. “The woman showed Richard Liu into the elevator,” says one. “The woman pushed the floor button voluntarily,” says another. “Once again,” says a third, “the woman gestured an invitation.”

      Still, the video does not show the most crucial moment, which is what happened between Mr. Liu and Ms. Liu after the apartment door closed.

      “The full video depicts a young woman unable to locate her own apartment and a billionaire instructing her to take his arm to steady her gait,” said Wil Florin, Ms. Liu’s attorney, who accused Mr. Liu’s representatives of releasing the video. “The release of an incomplete video and the forceful silencing of Jingyao’s many social media supporters will not stop a Minnesota civil jury from hearing the truth.”

      JD.com declined to comment on the origin of the video.

      In the eyes of many, it contradicted the narrative in Ms. Liu’s lawsuit of an innocent, helpless victim. In my WeChat groups, men and women alike said the video confirmed their suspicions that Ms. Liu was asking for sex and was only after Mr. Liu’s money. A young woman from a good family would never socialize on a business occasion like that, some men said. A businesswoman asked why Ms. Liu didn’t say no to drinks.

      At first, I saw the video as a setback for China’s #MeToo movement, which was already facing insurmountable obstacles from a deeply misogynistic society, internet censors and a patriarchal government. Already, my “no means no” arguments with acquaintances had been met with groans.
      Subscribe to With Interest

      Catch up and prep for the week ahead with this newsletter of the most important business insights, delivered Sundays.

      The rare people of prominence who spoke in support of Ms. Liu were getting vicious criticism. Zhao Hejuan, chief executive of the technology media company TMTPost, had to disable comments on her Weibo account after she received death threats. She had criticized Mr. Liu, a married man with a young daughter, for not living up to the expectations of a public figure.

      Then I came across a seven-minute video titled “I’m also a victim of sexual assault,” in which four women and a man spoke to the camera about their stories. The video, produced by organizers of the hashtag #HereForUs, tried to clearly define sexual assault to viewers, explaining that it can take place between people who know each other and under complex circumstances.

      The man was molested by an older boy in his childhood. One of the women was raped by a classmate when she was sick in bed. One was assaulted by a powerful man at work but did not dare speak out because she thought nobody would believe her. One was raped after consuming too much alcohol on a date.

      “Slut-shaming doesn’t come from others,” she said in the video. “I’ll be the first one to slut-shame myself.”

      One woman with a red cross tattooed on her throat said an older boy in her neighborhood had assaulted her when she was 10. When she ran home, her parents scolded her for being late after school.

      “My childhood ended then and there,” she said in the video. “I haven’t died because I toughed it out all these years.”

      The video has been viewed nearly 700,000 times on Weibo. But creators of the video still have a hard time speaking out further, reflecting the obstacles faced by feminists in China.

      It was produced by a group of people who started the #HereForUs hashtag in China as a way to support victims of sexual harassment and assault. They were excited when I reached out to interview them. One of them postponed her visit to her parents for the interview.

      Then the day before our meeting, they messaged me that they no longer wanted to be interviewed. They worried that their appearance in The New York Times could anger the Chinese government and get their hashtag censored. I got a similar response from the organizer of the #NoPerfectVictim hashtag. Another woman begged me not to connect her name to the Chinese government for fear of losing her job.

      Their reluctance is understandable. They believe their hashtags have brought women together and given them the courage to share their stories. Some victims say that simply telling someone about their experiences is therapeutic, making the hashtags too valuable to be lost, the organizers said.

      “The world is full of things that hurt women,” said Liang Xiaowen, a 27-year-old lawyer now living in New York City. She wrote online that she had been molested by a family acquaintance when she was 11 and had lived with shame and guilt ever since. “I want to expand the boundaries of safe space by sharing my story.”

      A decentralized, behind-the-scenes approach is essential if the #MeToo movement is to grow in China, said Lü Pin, founding editor of Feminist Voices, an advocacy platform for women’s rights in China.

      “It’s amazing that they created such a phenomenon under such difficult circumstances,” Ms. Lü said.

      https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/05/business/china-richard-liu-rape-video-metoo.html
      #Chine #vidéo

  • Selon l’#ONU, Julian #Assange présente des symptômes de « #torture #psychologique » - Le Point
    https://www.lepoint.fr/monde/selon-l-onu-julian-assange-presente-des-symptomes-de-torture-psychologique-3

    Le rapporteur de l’ONU sur la torture, qui a rencontré le #lanceur_d'alerte, estime qu’il a été « exposé à des formes graves de peines ou de traitements inhumains ».

    [...]

    En plus de maux physiques [...]

    #whistleblower

  • From Bosnia and Herzegovina a video showing seven adults and five children detained in cage-like detention cells in #Klobuk near #Trebinje as part of the #International_Border_Crossing (#MGP) was published. It is terrifying to read the official statement of the BiH Border Police, where they state how all is in line with EU standards- we must ask whether inhumane and humiliating treatment of people who migrate is an EU standard?

    #Bosnie #Bosnie-Herzégovine #Monténégro #frontières #asile #migrations #réfugiés #route_des_Balkans #Balkans

    –-> signalé par Inicijativa Dobrodosli, via leur mailing-list (29.04.2019)

    Held in a cage?!

    We have received footage and photos displaying two detained families after they were pushed back in the border area between Bosnia and Herzegovina with Montenegro, Klobuk border crossing near Trebinje.


    Video and the photos show people being held in cage-like detention cells, previously also seen and mentioned with the case of the Houssiny family. There were reportedly 7 adults and 5 children among the detained people. The youngest is 3 years old.

    They were detained in this way and stayed over night. However, the authorities claim everything is “by the book” and in accordance with the EU standards.

    They say since the border crossing where people were later taken to is not a firm building, they have no barred rooms to detain people, so they use this — ironically funded by the European Commission — in order to “provide daylight” to the people and they stress the people were not locked inside.

    Either way, the question remains — is this the standard and a collective decision to treat and detain currently the most vulnerable group in the planet, refugees?

    Will anyone finally bring into question and condemn the methods and current human rights breaking detention and push back practice?

    https://medium.com/are-you-syrious/ays-daily-digest-23-4-19-weekend-of-violent-push-backs-from-croatia-and-bosn

    Lien vers la vidéo:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4YAoBPGBHw


    #cages #cage #vidéo #animalisation #brutalisation

    • In our neighbouring country Bosnia and Herzegovina, the local authorities consider volunteers to disturb public order and peace by helping migrants. As a result, the work of some of them has been banned - you can read more about it in this article: https://www.telegram.hr/politika-kriminal/vlasti-bih-smatraju-da-volonteri-remete-javni-red-i-mir-tako-sto-pomazu-mig. This is the last example of the criminalization of solidarity work, yet it’s not the only one: nowadays Europe is becoming more and more a place of repression towards those who are willing to oppose hate speech and intolerance, promoting and everyday practicing solidarity. You can read more about it in this article: http://novilist.hr/Komentari/Kolumne/Pronadena-zemlja-Borisa-Pavelica/BORIS-PAVELIC-Brigade-bespomocnih?meta_refresh=true.

      Reçu via la mailing-list Inicijativa Dobrodošli, le 31.05.2019

    • Migrants dying in Bosnia: Red Cross

      Thousands of migrants and refugees are stranded in Bosnia on their way to Western Europe. They are in desperate need of humanitarian assistance. The international Red Cross says some have died while trying to find shelter.

      About 6,000 people have entered Bosnia and Herzegovina since the start of the year, according to the country’s security agencies. But all the transit centers, which can accommodate around 3,500 people, are full, forcing thousands to sleep rough.

      “People are sleeping in parks, in carparks, on the footpath, and in dangerous buildings,” said Indira Kulenovic, operations manager for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) in Bosnia.

      “A few weeks ago, three migrants sheltering in an abandoned building burned to death when a candle they were using caused a fire. Soon after, another fell from the top floor of a building he was sheltering in. Psychological stress among migrants is high – just last week one man set himself on fire in desperation,” Kulenovic said.

      ‘Humanitarian crisis’

      Bosnia is on the route of thousands of people from Asia and North Africa who try to enter Europe via neighboring Croatia, an EU member state. Last year, about 25,000 people entered Bosnia from Serbia and Montenegro.

      Mobile teams from the Bosnian Red Cross society have been handing out food, water, clothes, blankets and first aid to the migrants, as well as trying to provide psychological support.

      Red Cross workers are also distributing information about active landmine fields to warn people of the dangers of unexploded bombs. Bosnia and Herzegovina is one of the most landmine-contaminated countries in Europe.

      The Red Cross is working in five migrant centers across the country providing meals for 3,000 people a day, as well as clothing, bedding, tents and first aid. Meanwhile, the UN migration agency, IOM, is providing food supplies.

      Despite their efforts, the head of the Bosnian Red Cross, Rajko Lazic, says living conditions for many people remain inadequate in the centers and worse for those outside. “The situation has reached a critical point. This is a humanitarian crisis,” Lazic said.

      Disease outbreaks

      In migrant reception centers, overcrowding has led to an increase in infectious diseases. The Bosnian health minister, Nermina Cemalovic, said on 15 May there were 800 cases of scabies in transit centers in Bihac, one of the western towns where migrants are concentrated.

      Health workers have also been trying to prevent an outbreak of measles after aid workers were hospitalized with the disease.

      “We are extremely concerned for people on the move in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” the IFRC’s Kulenovic said. “They are arriving in poor condition, and many, including children, have walked for weeks. They are hungry, exhausted, sick and cold and traumatized by their journeys. The recent wet weather has just made their journeys worse.”

      Kulenovic added that the local population was also suffering from the pressure that extra numbers had put on services, land and property. The IFRC and the Red Cross Society of Bosnia aim to provide food, first aid and other assistance to 7,600 of the most vulnerable migrants as well as cash grants for 1,500 host families during 2019.

      https://www.infomigrants.net/en/post/17218/migrants-dying-in-bosnia-red-cross?ref=tw
      #mourir_en_Bosnie #morts #décès #Kljuc #OIM #IOM #Croix-Route

  • Ex-CIA Officer Miles Copeland : Secret Agent Man – Rolling Stone
    https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/secret-agent-man-52557

    1986

    You’ve got to know who [the terrorists] are. You’ve got to know their reasons for doing it. And you’ve got to manipulate them in one way or another. We have to somehow come to grips with the problem. The Israelis went in to Lebanon and killed tens of thousands of people. They say, “That’s exaggerating, we didn’t kill but 5,000 people.” Okay, let’s say they killed only 2,000 people, which is a very modest estimate. But they destroyed Lebanon. They then set up groups against each other, made chaos ten times worse than it already was. Instead of helping the Shiites — the Shiites welcomed the Israelis in — we, the United States, gave a billion dollars to the Israelis. One billion we gave because it costs a lot of money to destroy someone else’s country. We gave peanuts — Red Cross supplies — to the Shiites. What we should have done is gone in there and said to the Shiites: “Look, a lot of injustice has been done. We’re going to put your orange groves back and put you back commercially. . . . “

    [...] Let’s get back to the reason these guys are terrorists. They’re terrorists because their orange groves have been destroyed and they’ve got nothing to do. They can’t even get to their farms because the Israelis have declared them out of bounds and destroyed a lot of them. Now, the CIA’s job is to explain all of this to our government. That’s the main job of the CIA — to go to the White House and explain to the president that the only reason these terrorists are terrorists is because of the way they’ve been treated, and they’ve got nothing else to do. In fact, I’ll tell you quite frankly, if people came into Alabama, my home state, and destroyed my farms and kicked me around and kicked my children around, I’m going to become a terrorist, just as the French became terrorists under the Germans in World War II. It’s understandable. The CIA understood this and understood it very well and explained it to the president. But we had pressures from Congress. The members of Congress don’t give a damn about foreign affairs. They give a damn about their next election. They have to do what makes them popular enough with their constituents to get reelected. And their constituency cares about one place in this world, and that’s the United States.

    #politiciens

  • The Coup Has Failed & Now the U.S. Is Looking to Wage War: Venezuelan Foreign Minister Speaks Out | Democracy Now!
    https://www.democracynow.org/2019/2/25/the_coup_has_failed_now_the

    The United Nations, the Red Cross and other relief organizations have refused to work with the U.S. on delivering aid to #Venezuela, which they say is politically motivated. Venezuela has allowed aid to be flown in from Russia and from some international organizations, but it has refused to allow in aid from the United States, describing it as a Trojan horse for an eventual U.S. invasion. On Sunday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Maduro’s days in office are numbered. We speak with Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza, who has recently held secret talks with Trump’s special envoy Elliott Abrams.

    #etats-unis #humanitaire

  • 56,800 migrant dead and missing : ’They are human beings’

    One by one, five to a grave, the coffins are buried in the red earth of this ill-kept corner of a South African cemetery. The scrawl on the cheap wood attests to their anonymity: “Unknown B/Male.”

    These men were migrants from elsewhere in Africa with next to nothing who sought a living in the thriving underground economy of Gauteng province, a name that roughly translates to “land of gold.” Instead of fortune, many found death, their bodies unnamed and unclaimed — more than 4,300 in Gauteng between 2014 and 2017 alone.

    Some of those lives ended here at the Olifantsvlei cemetery, in silence, among tufts of grass growing over tiny placards that read: Pauper Block. There are coffins so tiny that they could belong only to children.

    As migration worldwide soars to record highs, far less visible has been its toll: The tens of thousands of people who die or simply disappear during their journeys, never to be seen again. In most cases, nobody is keeping track: Barely counted in life, these people don’t register in death , as if they never lived at all.

    An Associated Press tally has documented at least 56,800 migrants dead or missing worldwide since 2014 — almost double the number found in the world’s only official attempt to try to count them, by the U.N.’s International Organization for Migration. The IOM toll as of Oct. 1 was more than 28,500. The AP came up with almost 28,300 additional dead or missing migrants by compiling information from other international groups, requesting forensic records, missing persons reports and death records, and sifting through data from thousands of interviews with migrants.

    The toll is the result of migration that is up 49 percent since the turn of the century, with more than 258 million international migrants in 2017, according to the United Nations. A growing number have drowned, died in deserts or fallen prey to traffickers, leaving their families to wonder what on earth happened to them. At the same time, anonymous bodies are filling cemeteries around the world, like the one in Gauteng.

    The AP’s tally is still low. More bodies of migrants lie undiscovered in desert sands or at the bottom of the sea. And families don’t always report loved ones as missing because they migrated illegally, or because they left home without saying exactly where they were headed.

    The official U.N. toll focuses mostly on Europe, but even there cases fall through the cracks. The political tide is turning against migrants in Europe just as in the United States, where the government is cracking down heavily on caravans of Central Americans trying to get in . One result is that money is drying up for projects to track migration and its costs.

    For example, when more than 800 people died in an April 2015 shipwreck off the coast of Italy, Europe’s deadliest migrant sea disaster, Italian investigators pledged to identify them and find their families. More than three years later, under a new populist government, funding for this work is being cut off.

    Beyond Europe, information is even more scarce. Little is known about the toll in South America, where the Venezuelan migration is among the world’s biggest today, and in Asia, the top region for numbers of migrants.

    The result is that governments vastly underestimate the toll of migration, a major political and social issue in most of the world today.

    “No matter where you stand on the whole migration management debate....these are still human beings on the move,” said Bram Frouws, the head of the Mixed Migration Centre , based in Geneva, which has done surveys of more than 20,000 migrants in its 4Mi project since 2014. “Whether it’s refugees or people moving for jobs, they are human beings.”

    They leave behind families caught between hope and mourning, like that of Safi al-Bahri. Her son, Majdi Barhoumi, left their hometown of Ras Jebel, Tunisia, on May 7, 2011, headed for Europe in a small boat with a dozen other migrants. The boat sank and Barhoumi hasn’t been heard from since. In a sign of faith that he is still alive, his parents built an animal pen with a brood of hens, a few cows and a dog to stand watch until he returns.

    “I just wait for him. I always imagine him behind me, at home, in the market, everywhere,” said al-Bahari. “When I hear a voice at night, I think he’s come back. When I hear the sound of a motorcycle, I think my son is back.”

    ———————————————————————

    EUROPE: BOATS THAT NEVER ARRIVE

    Of the world’s migration crises, Europe’s has been the most cruelly visible. Images of the lifeless body of a Kurdish toddler on a beach, frozen tent camps in Eastern Europe, and a nearly numbing succession of deadly shipwrecks have been transmitted around the world, adding to the furor over migration.

    In the Mediterranean, scores of tankers, cargo boats, cruise ships and military vessels tower over tiny, crowded rafts powered by an outboard motor for a one-way trip. Even larger boats carrying hundreds of migrants may go down when soft breezes turn into battering winds and thrashing waves further from shore.

    Two shipwrecks and the deaths of at least 368 people off the coast of Italy in October 2013 prompted the IOM’s research into migrant deaths. The organization has focused on deaths in the Mediterranean, although its researchers plead for more data from elsewhere in the world. This year alone, the IOM has found more than 1,700 deaths in the waters that divide Africa and Europe.

    Like the lost Tunisians of Ras Jebel, most of them set off to look for work. Barhoumi, his friends, cousins and other would-be migrants camped in the seaside brush the night before their departure, listening to the crash of the waves that ultimately would sink their raft.

    Khalid Arfaoui had planned to be among them. When the group knocked at his door, it wasn’t fear that held him back, but a lack of cash. Everyone needed to chip in to pay for the boat, gas and supplies, and he was short about $100. So he sat inside and watched as they left for the beachside campsite where even today locals spend the night before embarking to Europe.

    Propelled by a feeble outboard motor and overburdened with its passengers, the rubber raft flipped, possibly after grazing rocks below the surface on an uninhabited island just offshore. Two bodies were retrieved. The lone survivor was found clinging to debris eight hours later.

    The Tunisian government has never tallied its missing, and the group never made it close enough to Europe to catch the attention of authorities there. So these migrants never have been counted among the dead and missing.

    “If I had gone with them, I’d be lost like the others,” Arfaoui said recently, standing on the rocky shoreline with a group of friends, all of whom vaguely planned to leave for Europe. “If I get the chance, I’ll do it. Even if I fear the sea and I know I might die, I’ll do it.”

    With him that day was 30-year-old Mounir Aguida, who had already made the trip once, drifting for 19 hours after the boat engine cut out. In late August this year, he crammed into another raft with seven friends, feeling the waves slam the flimsy bow. At the last minute he and another young man jumped out.

    “It didn’t feel right,” Aguida said.

    There has been no word from the other six — yet another group of Ras Jebel’s youth lost to the sea. With no shipwreck reported, no survivors to rescue and no bodies to identify, the six young men are not counted in any toll.

    In addition to watching its own youth flee, Tunisia and to a lesser degree neighboring Algeria are transit points for other Africans north bound for Europe. Tunisia has its own cemetery for unidentified migrants, as do Greece, Italy and Turkey. The one at Tunisia’s southern coast is tended by an unemployed sailor named Chamseddin Marzouk.

    Of around 400 bodies interred in the coastal graveyard since it opened in 2005, only one has ever been identified. As for the others who lie beneath piles of dirt, Marzouk couldn’t imagine how their families would ever learn their fate.

    “Their families may think that the person is still alive, or that he’ll return one day to visit,” Marzouk said. “They don’t know that those they await are buried here, in Zarzis, Tunisia.”

    ——————

    AFRICA: VANISHING WITHOUT A TRACE

    Despite talk of the ’waves’ of African migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean, as many migrate within Africa — 16 million — as leave for Europe. In all, since 2014, at least 18,400 African migrants have died traveling within Africa, according to the figures compiled from AP and IOM records. That includes more than 4,300 unidentified bodies in a single South African province, and 8,700 whose traveling companions reported their disappearance en route out of the Horn of Africa in interviews with 4Mi.

    When people vanish while migrating in Africa, it is often without a trace. The IOM says the Sahara Desert may well have killed more migrants than the Mediterranean. But no one will ever know for sure in a region where borders are little more than lines drawn on maps and no government is searching an expanse as large as the continental United States. The harsh sun and swirling desert sands quickly decompose and bury bodies of migrants, so that even when they turn up, they are usually impossible to identify .

    With a prosperous economy and stable government, South Africa draws more migrants than any other country in Africa. The government is a meticulous collector of fingerprints — nearly every legal resident and citizen has a file somewhere — so bodies without any records are assumed to have been living and working in the country illegally. The corpses are fingerprinted when possible, but there is no regular DNA collection.

    South Africa also has one of the world’s highest rates of violent crime and police are more focused on solving domestic cases than identifying migrants.

    “There’s logic to that, as sad as it is....You want to find the killer if you’re a policeman, because the killer could kill more people,” said Jeanine Vellema, the chief specialist of the province’s eight mortuaries. Migrant identification, meanwhile, is largely an issue for foreign families — and poor ones at that.

    Vellema has tried to patch into the police missing persons system, to build a system of electronic mortuary records and to establish a protocol where a DNA sample is taken from every set of remains that arrive at the morgue. She sighs: “Resources.” It’s a word that comes up 10 times in a half-hour conversation.

    So the bodies end up at Olifantsvlei or a cemetery like it, in unnamed graves. On a recent visit by AP, a series of open rectangles awaited the bodies of the unidentified and unclaimed. They did not wait long: a pickup truck drove up, piled with about 10 coffins, five per grave. There were at least 180 grave markers for the anonymous dead, with multiple bodies in each grave.

    The International Committee of the Red Cross, which is working with Vellema, has started a pilot project with one Gauteng morgue to take detailed photos, fingerprints, dental information and DNA samples of unidentified bodies. That information goes to a database where, in theory, the bodies can be traced.

    “Every person has a right to their dignity. And to their identity,” said Stephen Fonseca, the ICRC regional forensic manager.

    ————————————

    THE UNITED STATES: “THAT’S HOW MY BROTHER USED TO SLEEP”

    More than 6,000 miles (9,000 kilometers) away, in the deserts that straddle the U.S.-Mexico border, lie the bodies of migrants who perished trying to cross land as unforgiving as the waters of the Mediterranean. Many fled the violence and poverty of Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador or Mexico. Some are found months or years later as mere skeletons. Others make a last, desperate phone call and are never heard from again.

    In 2010 the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team and the local morgue in Pima County, Ariz., began to organize efforts to put names to the anonymous bodies found on both sides of the border. The “Border Project” has since identified more than 183 people — a fraction of the total.

    At least 3,861 migrants are dead and missing on the route from Mexico to the United States since 2014, according to the combined AP and IOM total. The tally includes missing person reports from the Colibri Center for Human Rights on the U.S. side as well as the Argentine group’s data from the Mexican side. The painstaking work of identification can take years, hampered by a lack of resources, official records and coordination between countries — and even between states.

    For many families of the missing, it is their only hope, but for the families of Juan Lorenzo Luna and Armando Reyes, that hope is fading.

    Luna, 27, and Reyes, 22, were brothers-in-law who left their small northern Mexico town of Gomez Palacio in August 2016. They had tried to cross to the U.S. four months earlier, but surrendered to border patrol agents in exhaustion and were deported.

    They knew they were risking their lives — Reyes’ father died migrating in 1995, and an uncle went missing in 2004. But Luna, a quiet family man, wanted to make enough money to buy a pickup truck and then return to his wife and two children. Reyes wanted a job where he wouldn’t get his shoes dirty and could give his newborn daughter a better life.

    Of the five who left Gomez Palacio together, two men made it to safety, and one man turned back. The only information he gave was that the brothers-in-law had stopped walking and planned to turn themselves in again. That is the last that is known of them.

    Officials told their families that they had scoured prisons and detention centers, but there was no sign of the missing men. Cesaria Orona even consulted a fortune teller about her missing son, Armando, and was told he had died in the desert.

    One weekend in June 2017, volunteers found eight bodies next to a military area of the Arizona desert and posted the images online in the hopes of finding family. Maria Elena Luna came across a Facebook photo of a decaying body found in an arid landscape dotted with cactus and shrubs, lying face-up with one leg bent outward. There was something horribly familiar about the pose.

    “That’s how my brother used to sleep,” she whispered.

    Along with the bodies, the volunteers found a credential of a boy from Guatemala, a photo and a piece of paper with a number written on it. The photo was of Juan Lorenzo Luna, and the number on the paper was for cousins of the family. But investigators warned that a wallet or credential could have been stolen, as migrants are frequently robbed.

    “We all cried,” Luna recalled. “But I said, we cannot be sure until we have the DNA test. Let’s wait.”

    Luna and Orona gave DNA samples to the Mexican government and the Argentine group. In November 2017, Orona received a letter from the Mexican government saying that there was the possibility of a match for Armando with some bone remains found in Nuevo Leon, a state that borders Texas. But the test was negative.

    The women are still waiting for results from the Argentine pathologists. Until then, their relatives remain among the uncounted.

    Orona holds out hope that the men may be locked up, or held by “bad people.” Every time Luna hears about clandestine graves or unidentified bodies in the news, the anguish is sharp.

    “Suddenly all the memories come back,” she said. “I do not want to think.”

    ————————

    SOUTH AMERICA: “NO ONE WANTS TO ADMIT THIS IS A REALITY”

    The toll of the dead and the missing has been all but ignored in one of the largest population movements in the world today — that of nearly 2 million Venezuelans fleeing from their country’s collapse. These migrants have hopped buses across the borders, boarded flimsy boats in the Caribbean, and — when all else failed — walked for days along scorching highways and freezing mountain trails. Vulnerable to violence from drug cartels, hunger and illness that lingers even after reaching their destination, they have disappeared or died by the hundreds.

    “They can’t withstand a trip that hard, because the journey is very long,” said Carlos Valdes, director of neighboring Colombia’s national forensic institute. “And many times, they only eat once a day. They don’t eat. And they die.” Valdes said authorities don’t always recover the bodies of those who die, as some migrants who have entered the country illegally are afraid to seek help.

    Valdes believes hypothermia has killed some as they trek through the mountain tundra region, but he had no idea how many. One migrant told the AP he saw a family burying someone wrapped in a white blanket with red flowers along the frigid journey.

    Marta Duque, 55, has had a front seat to the Venezuela migration crisis from her home in Pamplona, Colombia. She opens her doors nightly to provide shelter for families with young children. Pamplona is one of the last cities migrants reach before venturing up a frigid mountain paramo, one of the most dangerous parts of the trip for migrants traveling by foot. Temperatures dip well below freezing.

    She said inaction from authorities has forced citizens like her to step in.

    “Everyone just seems to pass the ball,” she said. “No one wants to admit this is a reality.”

    Those deaths are uncounted, as are dozens in the sea. Also uncounted are those reported missing in Colombia, Peru and Ecuador. In all at least 3,410 Venezuelans have been reported missing or dead in a migration within Latin America whose dangers have gone relatively unnoticed; many of the dead perished from illnesses on the rise in Venezuela that easily would have found treatment in better times.

    Among the missing is Randy Javier Gutierrez, who was walking through Colombia with a cousin and his aunt in hopes of reaching Peru to reunite with his mother.

    Gutierrez’s mother, Mariela Gamboa, said that a driver offered a ride to the two women, but refused to take her son. The women agreed to wait for him at the bus station in Cali, about 160 miles (257 kilometers) ahead, but he never arrived. Messages sent to his phone since that day four months ago have gone unread.

    “I’m very worried,” his mother said. “I don’t even know what to do.”

    ———————————

    ASIA: A VAST UNKNOWN

    The region with the largest overall migration, Asia, also has the least information on the fate of those who disappear after leaving their homelands. Governments are unwilling or unable to account for citizens who leave for elsewhere in the region or in the Mideast, two of the most common destinations, although there’s a growing push to do so.

    Asians make up 40 percent of the world’s migrants, and more than half of them never leave the region. The Associated Press was able to document more than 8,200 migrants who disappeared or died after leaving home in Asia and the Mideast, including thousands in the Philippines and Indonesia.

    Thirteen of the top 20 migration pathways from Asia take place within the region. These include Indian workers heading to the United Arab Emirates, Bangladeshis heading to India, Rohingya Muslims escaping persecution in Myanmar, and Afghans crossing the nearest border to escape war. But with large-scale smuggling and trafficking of labor, and violent displacements, the low numbers of dead and missing indicate not safe travel but rather a vast unknown.

    Almass was just 14 when his widowed mother reluctantly sent him and his 11-year-old brother from their home in Khost, Afghanistan, into that unknown. The payment for their trip was supposed to get them away from the Taliban and all the way to Germany via a chain of smugglers. The pair crammed first into a pickup with around 40 people, walked for a few days at the border, crammed into a car, waited a bit in Tehran, and walked a few more days.

    His brother Murtaza was exhausted by the time they reached the Iran-Turkey border. But the smuggler said it wasn’t the time to rest — there were at least two border posts nearby and the risk that children far younger travelling with them would make noise.

    Almass was carrying a baby in his arms and holding his brother’s hand when they heard the shout of Iranian guards. Bullets whistled past as he tumbled head over heels into a ravine and lost consciousness.

    Alone all that day and the next, Almass stumbled upon three other boys in the ravine who had also become separated from the group, then another four. No one had seen his brother. And although the younger boy had his ID, it had been up to Almass to memorize the crucial contact information for the smuggler.

    When Almass eventually called home, from Turkey, he couldn’t bear to tell his mother what had happened. He said Murtaza couldn’t come to the phone but sent his love.

    That was in early 2014. Almass, who is now 18, hasn’t spoken to his family since.

    Almass said he searched for his brother among the 2,773 children reported to the Red Cross as missing en route to Europe. He also looked for himself among the 2,097 adults reported missing by children. They weren’t on the list.

    With one of the world’s longest-running exoduses, Afghans face particular dangers in bordering countries that are neither safe nor welcoming. Over a period of 10 months from June 2017 to April 2018, 4Mi carried out a total of 962 interviews with Afghan migrants and refugees in their native languages around the world, systematically asking a series of questions about the specific dangers they had faced and what they had witnessed.

    A total of 247 migrant deaths were witnessed by the interviewed migrants, who reported seeing people killed in violence from security forces or starving to death. The effort is the first time any organization has successfully captured the perils facing Afghans in transit to destinations in Asia and Europe.

    Almass made it from Asia to Europe and speaks halting French now to the woman who has given him a home in a drafty 400-year-old farmhouse in France’s Limousin region. But his family is lost to him. Their phone number in Afghanistan no longer works, their village is overrun with Taliban, and he has no idea how to find them — or the child whose hand slipped from his grasp four years ago.

    “I don’t know now where they are,” he said, his face anguished, as he sat on a sun-dappled bench. “They also don’t know where I am.”

    https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/global-lost-56800-migrants-dead-missing-years-58890913
    #décès #morts #migrations #réfugiés #asile #statistiques #chiffres #monde #Europe #Asie #Amérique_latine #Afrique #USA #Etats-Unis #2014 #2015 #2016 #2017 #2018
    ping @reka @simplicissimus

  • No man’s land at Paris airport: Where France keeps foreigners who’ve been refused entry

    Every day, foreigners suspected of trying to enter France illegally are taken to a special area of Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport where they are held at a facility dubbed #ZAPI. Located just a stone’s throw away from the airport’s runways, the ultra-secure area is closed to the general public. NGOs say ZAPI is just another name for a prison, where foreigner’s rights are flouted and where expulsions are fast-tracked. InfoMigrants was granted exclusive access to it.

    Audrey is pulling funny faces at the little girl she’s holding in her arms. “She’s not mine,” she says, and points to the girl’s mother who is sitting on another bench just a few metres away. “I’m just playing with her to pass the time,” she says. Twenty-eight-year-old Audrey from Gabon currently lives inside the four walls of the Charles de Gaulle airport’s “waiting zone”, or ZAPI, where people who have been refused entry onto French territory are being held while authorities decide what to do with them.

    Audrey’s laugh is barely audible. Neither is that of the little girl. The loud noise of the aircraft that just touched down some 50 metres away from them have drowned out all the surrounding sounds. “The noise, it’s hard… It prevents us from sleeping, we hear the planes all the time…,” the young woman complains without even looking at the giant aircraft whose wings are now gracing the fence of ZAPI.

    This tiny piece of no man’s land lies just next to one of the airport’s runways. “ZAPI is a bit like a protrusion of the international zone,” Alexis Marty explains, who heads up the immigration department at the French border police (PAF). In legal terms, the zone is not deemed to be a part of French territory. “It’s a zone where people end up when they’ve been refused entry into France and the Schengen area” by not having a visa, or because there are suspicions that their travel documents have been forged… Audrey, who’s been there for nearly a week, recalls how she was intercepted just as she was getting off the plane. She says she was placed at ZAPI because she didn’t have a “hotel” and “not enough money”.

    To visit France for a period lasting up to three months, foreigners need to fulfill certain conditions before being allowed to touch French ground: They need to have a valid passport, a visa (depending on the nationality), a medical insurance covering their stay, proof of lodging (hotel reservation or with family members), enough funds to cover their stay as well as a return ticket.

    Ill-prepared tourists or illegal immigrants?

    Foreigners who are stopped by customs officers because they don’t fulfill the conditions linked to their stay generally end up at ZAPI. “We don’t send everyone there,” Marty explains, however, pointing to certain nuances. “There are confused tourists who’ve just prepared their vacations really poorly, and who’ve forgotten essential documents. But there are also those who have different intentions, and who produce forged documents to try to enter European territory illegally.”

    It’s difficult to tell an ill-prepared tourist and a potential illegal immigrant apart. This is why the verification is done in several steps. “We don’t send people to ZAPI right away, we first carry out an initial check. When a suspicious person steps out of the plane, we bring them into a separate room to verify their documents, to ask them questions, listen to their replies and to verify any additional information they give us. If all goes well, we release them after a few hours,” he explains. “But if the incoherencies and the doubts persist, if the person produces fake documents or no documents at all, if a ‘migration risk’ exists for the person, we place them in ZAPI.”

    On this particular October day, the airport’s “waiting zone” houses a total of 96 people, of which one is an unaccompanied minor. The number of people changes on a daily basis. “Generally, a person spends four and a half days at ZAPI, so the rotation is pretty fast,” police commander Serge Berquier, who is the head of ZAPI, says. The maximum time a person can stay there is 20 days. Men, women and children – even minors traveling on their own – may be sent there. There is no age limit.

    After a three-week stay, a so-called “ZAPIst” is left with three options: Either they are finally granted entry into France (with a safe conduct), they are sent back to the country they traveled from, or a legal case is opened against them (for refusing to board, for forging documents, etc.). In 2016, some 7,000 people were held at the airport at some point, of which 53 percent were immediately refused entry into France.

    While “ZAPIsts” wait for their fates to be decided, they do what they can to kill time. They stroll in the outdoor space, they stay in their rooms, or they hang out in the TV room. The PAF makes a point of clarifying that the “ZAPIsts” are not “detainees” but rather “retainees”. This means that they have rights; family members can visit, they have access to catering services and can get legal and humanitarian assistance from the Red Cross which has a permanent presence at the facility.

    “It’s not a prison,” Marty says. “Here, you can keep your personal belongings, your mobile phone, you can go in and out of the rooms as much as you like. The only restriction is that you’re not allowed to exit the premises.”

    It may not be a prison, but it’s definitely a place of deprivation. Not all mobile phones are allowed, and those equipped with a camera are confiscated automatically.

    It’s 11.45am, but no one seems to be around on the ground floor. The TV is on in the communal room, but there’s no one there to watch it. No one is using the public payphones which are available to the “ZAPIsts” 24/7. On the first floor, where the rooms are located, the hallways are more or less empty. “They’re most likely downstairs, in the canteen, lunch will be served soon,” a police officer says. “Otherwise they might be outside, in the garden, talking or smoking.”

    The police presence is fairly discrete on the floor with the rooms, but every now and then the police officers can be heard calling someone through the loud-speakers that have been installed in the building. “We use it to call people who have a visit or a meeting. It helps us avoid having to run through the hallways to find them,” Berquier, the head of ZAPI, explains while showing us around the premises. “There are 67 rooms. Some are reserved for families, and others for people with reduced mobility […] There’s also an area reserved for unaccompanied minors and an area with games for them and for families.”

    La ZAPI compte au total une soixantaine de chambres Crdit InfoMigrants

    ‘Things can be improved’

    The atmosphere at ZAPI is calm, almost peaceful. Until Youssef, an Algerian who’s been held there for four days, turns up. He seems to be on his guard, and appears quite tense. “I’m still waiting for my suitcase, I don’t have any clothes to change with,” he complains and lights a cigarette. “The Red Cross is helping me out.” It can take several days for a person who’ve been placed in ZAPI to have their personal belongings returned to them. Checked-in luggage first has to be located and then controlled… During this period, the Red Cross does what it can in terms of clothing, offering T-shirts and underwear.

    Marty finds the situation with the luggage deplorable. “It’s evident that not everything is perfect, there are things that can be improved,” he admits. “To have a suitcase speedily returned to someone at ZAPI is among the things where progress can be made.”

    Returning home

    Audrey from Gabon and Youssef from Algeria, who have both found themselves blocked in this no-man’s land, have more or less the same story to tell. Both of them claim they came to France to visit family, insisting they did not intend to enter the country illegally. “But now, my situation isn’t very good,” the young woman says. Did she really come for the “tourist visit” she claims? Or did she try her chance at entering France by sneaking through the controls (customs)? It’s hard to know. The police have the same doubts when it comes to Youssef. “I came here to visit family, but I had a problem with my return ticket which didn’t match my visa,” he explains. Youssef says he wants to try to regularize his documents – “to buy a return ticket that conforms to the conditions” – in order to leave ZAPI and thereafter enter France. Audrey, on the other hand, says she has “given up”. She wants to go home now.

    The PAF sometimes comes across “people who ask to go home because they understand that their entry into France is compromised,” Marty explains. The costs of such returns are normally taken out of the pocket of the airline that flew the foreigner in question to France in the first place, and is undoubtedly a way for authorities to sanction the airlines and force them to be more vigilant when it comes to checking their passengers’ travel documents.

    The risk of failing an attempt to enter a country illegally is often higher for those who try to do so via air travel. “It’s an expensive trip, you have to pay for the ticket as well as the forged passport you need to fool the authorities, and this is before having to take the rigorous controls at the airports into account,” Marty says.

    The nationalities of migrants arriving by plane are often different from those who try to reach Europe by sea or by land. “The people at ZAPI are mainly from South America, Honduras, Brazil, and Nicaragua. Also from China and Russia. Some also come from North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa, but they are fewer in numbers.” On this particular day, the people in ZAPI’s courtyard are from Gabon, Chad, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, and South America.

    ’The aim is to deport’

    ZAPI also houses people seeking asylum. “There are people who demand protection in France as soon as they step off the plane,” Marty explains. “They tell border police […] Everything has been organized so that they know they have the right to demand asylum and that we’re ready to help them in their attempt to do so.”

    Charlene Cuartero-Saez works for Anafé, an association that helps foreigners who have been blocked between borders, and which has an office at ZAPI. She almost chokes when she hears the “model” description of the facility that Marty has given, saying it is far from the benevolent place he has been talking about.

    Cuartero-Saez has her desk in room 38 of the building, which has been converted into an Anafé office, Cuartero-Saez lists the different dysfunctions of the place: the poor ventilation, the restricted outdoor access, cameras in the communal areas, no laundry room… “It’s true that here, the material conditions are less difficult than elsewhere. Charles de Gaulle’s ZAPI is a bit like the display window for other ‘waiting zones’ in France. But that doesn’t prevent people from having their rights flouted, especially here.”

    ’Some are sent back just a few hours after their arrival in France’

    “[Police] say that people are informed of their rights in their native language, but in my opinion that is not always true. Many [officers] work on the principle that if the migrants speaks a few words of English, he or she doesn’t need an interpreter.”

    Anafé is also alarmed over the fast-speed returns of “ZAPIsts” – despite the existence of a “clear day” which normally gives a person 24 hours of respite at ZAPI. “This ‘clear day’ exists, yes, but you only get it if you ask for it! Many people don’t even know what it is,” Cuartero-Saez says. “There have been cases where people have been sent back to their countries just a few hours after arriving in France.”

    The law stipulates that asylum request can be filed at any moment – and thereby suspending an imminent deportation. In those cases, an Ofpra official comes to ZAPI to carry out a pre-assessment of the person’s request. The interview doesn’t decide on the asylum application itself, but evaluates the pertinence of the demand. A decision should be made within 20 days. If the demand is rejected, a deportation is imminent. A person filing a demand for asylum while at ZAPI can therefore receive a definite response within just a few days, whereas the average waiting time in France is between two and eight months or even more, depending on the case.

    Ces trois jeunes Sri-Lankais ont dpos une demande dasile aux frontires Crdit InfoMigrants

    “The aim of keeping [people in] this waiting area is to be able deport them, Cuartero-Saez states, and gives three asylum-seeking Sri Lankans who are currently staying at ZAPI as an example. The three men – all under the age of 30 – are in the courtyard and explain how they fear for their lives because they’re members of the separatist Tamil Tigers (LTTE) movement. All three have just been notified that their demands for asylum have been rejected.

    They show their rejection letters while seated on a bench in the sunshine. They speak neither French nor English and they don’t seem to know what to do next. They’ve been there for two weeks now. “We told them that they can appeal the decision. They didn’t know they could do that, no one had informed them of that,” Cuartero-Saez says.

    The three Tamils appear to be quite lost. They don’t seem to understand that they could face imminent deportation. In five days’ time, their retention at ZAPI will expire. “We don’t want to go back to Sri Lanka,” they say smiling. “We want to stay in France.”

    Aja, from Chad, and her two small daughters are in the same situation. They have been held at ZAPI for four days. Aja doesn’t want them to be returned to Chad, but she doesn’t want to demand asylum either. “I think I had a problem with money… That’s why they’re keeping me here. I’m here as a tourist,” she says, but adds that she “would very much like” to stay in France if it was possible. Because of this deadlock, she and her daughters also risk deportation.

    For those staying at ZAPI, the place is not synonymous with neither violence nor mistreatment but rather anxiety. At any given moment, PAF officers can try to force someone at ZAPI onboard a plane. “We have examples of people who don’t manage to register their asylum request in time,” Cuartero-Saez at Anafé says. “When the demand hasn’t been registered, the process is never launched… And so, without recourse, a person can be sent back in less than four days without even knowing his or her rights.”

    http://www.infomigrants.net/en/webdoc/146/no-man-s-land-at-paris-airport-where-france-keeps-foreigners-who-ve-be
    #Paris #aéroport #zone_de_transit #limbe #asile #migrations #réfugiés #déboutés #renvois #expulsions #détention #rétention #détention_administrative

  • Une brève histoire du Hardcore Punk Underground aux Philippines


    Tigger Pussy
    https://tigerpussyx.bandcamp.com/track/damaged-goods

    https://daily.bandcamp.com/2018/09/07/a-short-history-of-the-hardcore-punk-underground-in-the-philippines

    En 1981, les Dead Kennedys et Circle Jerks ont joué leur premier concert à San Francisco, dans un restaurant philippin appelé Mabuhay Gardens. Par coïncidence, le tout premier spectacle punk aux #Philippines a également eu lieu la même année, à 7 000 milles de distance. Le nom de cet événement historique ? Brave New World.

    Tout comme la légendaire « British Invasion » de plus d’une décennie, le #punk_hardcore - un mouvement déclenché par des jeunes de la classe ouvrière dans les rues du Royaume-Uni, des États-Unis et d’Australie au milieu des années 70 scène comme il était un changement de mer culturel ressenti dans le monde entier, y compris l’Asie du Sud-Est. Les Philippins ont été parmi les premiers dans cette région à développer leur propre version du hardcore punk ; cette tradition distincte datant de plusieurs décennies se poursuit encore aujourd’hui.

    Ce développement a été rendu possible grâce à Dante « Howlin ’Dave » David, un disc-jockey de la station de radio philippine DZRJ-AM, qui a joué la première chanson punk de la radio philippine « Anarchy In The UK ». jouer des chansons punk et new wave dans le cadre de sa rotation régulière. Howlin ’Dave a également créé la série de concerts Brave New World, du nom du roman dystopique d’Aldous Huxley, qui servait de tremplin à certains des plus grands noms du circuit local.

    Peut-être le personnage le plus essentiel de sortir de Brave New World était Tommy Tanchanco, chef de la tenue hardcore région du Tiers Monde Chaos et fondateur de Twisted Croix-Rouge, une cassette uniquement vénérée étiquette de bricolage qui a fonctionné de 1985 à 1989. Comme pour les concerts susmentionnés , la discographie des 17 albums du label définit les paramètres du son philippin encore naissant en défendant les talents locaux féroces tels que Dead Ends, Wuds, George Imbecile et The Idiots, Urban Bandits et Betrayed - le dernier ayant sorti un album en juillet dernier , après un hiatus de 32 ans.

    « Twisted Red Cross a été une bénédiction car Tommy a produit des groupes qui n’auraient pas pu enregistrer et sortir des albums eux-mêmes », explique le chanteur de Dead Ends, Al Dimalanta, dont le groupe a sorti son album Second Coming en 1986 . "Ces quelques années au milieu des années 80 ont eu un effet dans notre musique, mais je ne pense pas que cela se produira à nouveau dans le rock, pas dans cette ampleur."

    Comme avec la plupart des communautés hardcore des années 80, le #punk_underground philippin était animé par les jeunes, qui ont abordé leur art avec une honnêteté sans faille et (le plus souvent) des idéaux anti-establishment. « Nous avons aimé la façon dont le punk a permis aux enfants ordinaires de se réunir, de former un groupe, d’écrire des chansons représentant les pensées et les idéaux de la jeunesse philippine », explique Dimalanta, qui travaillait en tant que professeur. Lui et ses pairs ont passé une grande partie de la décennie à livrer des accusations musicales à la dictature de Ferdinand Marcos dans les clubs punks de Manille, comme On Disco sur Roxas Boulevard et Katrina’s à Malate (ce dernier étant souvent qualifié d’équivalent philippin du CBGB). des lieux comme le toit de la maison Matimyas.

    Dans les années 90, la scène hardcore avait commencé à disparaître à Manille. "Tous les punks ont disparu", se souvient Jep Peligro, créateur de Konspirazine , un zine de premier plan publié à la fin des années 90 et au début des années 2000, documentant la scène musicale locale du bricolage. Cependant, il y avait des pôles d’activités si vous saviez où regarder, comme à Laguna, une province au sud-est de Manille avec une culture punk bricolage riche, et la région voisine de Cavite.

    « Les groupes de Laguna étaient décidés à bouger un peu, et à rappeler au reste de la scène que nous étions toujours là, en train de faire notre travail en permanence », a déclaré Peligro. (Un vidéaste de la scène qui se fait appeler Crapsalad a soigneusement filmé des spectacles en direct à l’aide d’un caméscope, documentant le mouvement pour les générations futures.)

    Les maisons de disques et les petites distributions de bricolage comme Rare Music Distribution, dirigée par des membres d’un autre groupe emblématique, Philippine Violators et Middle Finger Records, ont également joué un rôle essentiel dans la survie des années 90. Il est important de noter que Peligro souligne que « [Ce] sont des labels punks dirigés par des punks réels » plutôt que des sociétés.

    L’impact de ces ancêtres continue de se faire sentir à ce jour, comme en témoignent les rassemblements de punk abondants et de longue durée du pays. L’année 2018 marque la 23e édition du festival Hardcore Punk de Cebu, un événement annuel mettant en vedette des groupes de partout aux Philippines sur la chaîne insulaire de Visayas. Plus au sud, dans les villes de Butuan et de Cagayan de Oro, il y a le Mindanao Hardcore Fest, maintenant dans sa 18ème année.

    « Tout ce que tout le monde a fait a contribué à la scène, que ce soit de manière géniale ou minable. Cela a en quelque sorte enrichi l’expérience et la communauté », explique Jon« Fishbone »Gonzales, bassiste du groupe punk Bad Omen, un pilier de la scène depuis un quart de siècle.

    Plus de 30 ans après la montée du hardcore philippin, et avec l’administration actuelle de Rodrigo Duterte sur le pays avec une main de fer, les principes punks sont plus que jamais d’actualité, sinon plus. Comme toujours, les participants déploient leurs accords de pouvoir et leurs voix vocales principalement pour exprimer leurs préoccupations face aux troubles sociaux afin de sensibiliser et, espérons-le, de planter les graines du changement.

    « Nous essayons de trouver de petites joies et de petites victoires dans notre vie quotidienne », déclare fièrement Peligro. « En même temps, ajoute-t-il, nous sommes le groupe de parias le plus énervé, le plus en colère et le plus opprimé de la société - notre président Google. »

    De la tenue anti-émeute à la #musique thrash-punk, la tradition philippine est à la base. Voici une liste restreinte de groupes qui perpétuent l’héritage aujourd’hui.

    https://tigerpussyx.bandcamp.com/track/daughter


    https://thoughtph.bandcamp.com/track/ink-on-my-skin-2

    #bandcamp
    https://thoughtph.bandcamp.com/track/justice

  • In Uganda’s Refugee Camps, South Sudanese Children Seek the Families They’ve Lost

    On a pale dirt road in the Palorinya refugee camp in northern Uganda, Raida Ijo clung to her 16-year-old son, Charles Abu. They sobbed quietly into each other’s shoulder. They had been separated for 19 months, since the day that fighting broke out between rebels and government troops in their village in South Sudan.

    Charles was halfway through a math class in their village, Andasire, in South Sudan’s Central Equatoria state, when the shooting started. He ran for the bush, and after a sleepless night in hiding, set off for the Ugandan border with his younger brother, Seme, 14.

    Their mother, Mrs. Ijo, feeling unwell, had checked herself into a hospital that morning. The boys knew that to try to find her would be too dangerous.

    The two brothers are among 17,600 minors who have crossed the border into Uganda without their parents since the outbreak of South Sudan’s civil war in 2013, according to the United Nations refugee agency. Over the last year, the pace of the conflict and the flow of refugees have slowed, but aid workers say it will take years to reunite splintered families.

    “When it’s already tough just to survive, and you don’t even know if your loved ones are alive, that adds a lot to the burden,” said Joane Holliger, a delegate of the International Committee of the Red Cross to a program in Uganda, Restoring Family Links. “There are a lot of protection concerns for unaccompanied children — child labor, teenage pregnancy, prostitution, child-headed families — so the quicker we can trace their parents, the better.”

    Over the last two years, 433 unaccompanied minors have been reunited with their parents in Uganda. Worldwide, the International Committee of the Red Cross has opened 99,342 cases as it tries to reunite families.

    In Uganda, the bulk of the work is done by Red Cross volunteers, called tracers, who work weekdays hoping to find missing family members in their allocated section of the camp.

    Agustin Soroba, 27, who was himself separated from his family for five months after being kidnapped, beaten and pressed into labor as an ammunition porter by South Sudanese soldiers, has been working as a tracer since February 2017.

    His area of operation is a series of blocks in Bidi Bidi camp — now Africa’s largest with around 280,000 refugees. On a recent Wednesday, he was doing the rounds of unaccompanied children in his area whose cases were still in progress, and checking on families who had been reunified.

    One visit was to a small mud-built home where Margaret Sitima, 18, has been waiting for over a year to reconnect with her mother, last seen on her way to the hospital in the Ugandan town of Arua, after being badly beaten by soldiers on her journey out of South Sudan.

    Mr. Soroba pressed her for any more details she might have, and told her he would try his best.

    His colleagues urge people to report missing family members. They also hang posters of the missing and run a hotline that allows refugees to phone separated family members.

    One old man called his wife — the first time they had spoken in 14 months — to let her know that he was in Bidi Bidi and that he missed her. A woman in a yellow T-shirt called relatives in South Sudan with the news that her son had been sick but was recovering.

    Many of the unaccompanied children have witnessed extreme violence, adding urgency to the challenge of reunifying them with their families.

    “Many of them are extremely disturbed,” said Richard Talish, 33, an employee of the World Vision charity, who runs a safe space for children in Bidi Bidi camp. “We try to keep them busy, so they’re not always thinking about the past.”

    Mr. Talish said that in art sessions, many children draw scenes of violence.

    Tracing can take time. The Abu brothers’ case illustrates the obstacles to reuniting families split by South Sudan’s war. The boys had no idea of their mother’s whereabouts and whether she was alive. They said their mother did not know her age and could not spell her name, making it harder to locate her. Like many rural South Sudanese, she has never owned a mobile phone or a Facebook account.
    Image

    When one of South Sudan’s three cellphone networks was taken offline in March over unpaid license fees, thousands lost their only means of contact.

    The tracing challenges are exacerbated by the lack of access to a centralized database of refugees in Uganda. A combination of confusion and corruption during refugee registrations, in the early months of the crisis, produced incomplete or erroneous records. Some refugees were registered more than once; others, not at all. Names were misspelled. Some records do not list a specific location within the camps, which sprawl for nearly 100 square miles of northern Uganda scrubland.

    Uganda is carrying out biometric registrations to clarify the number of refugees, following a scandal over inflated figures. Several government officials were suspended.

    Until their parents have been located, unaccompanied children live with foster families in the camps. Some are connected by charitable organizations, such as World Vision, which runs a database of potential foster caregivers, who must be matched by ethnicity and language with the child. Other children live with families they encountered on the road, or at reception areas near the border. Extended families and clans try to fill the gap.

    Florence Knight, 14, was one of six unaccompanied children taken in by a passing refugee family who found them hiding by the roadside near the burning remains of the truck that had taken them toward the border. The vehicle had been ambushed and most of its occupants killed.

    “They’re like my own children now,” said Ms. Knight’s new foster mother, Betty Leila, 32, who now has 13 children, stepchildren or foster children. Many cry at night because of bad dreams.

    A few blocks away, another teenage girl, Betty Abau, is living with a family who found her crying and alone beside a river on their journey to the Ugandan border. She looked down at the floor, wringing her hands as she talked. She had been at school when violence erupted and forced her to flee without her parents.

    “I don’t know if they are alive or dead,” said Ms. Abau.

    She said she had provided all the details she could recall to a tracing officer over a year ago, but had not received any updates. According to Lilias Diria, 32, Betty’s new foster mother, she is one of six unaccompanied children living just in this cluster of half a dozen homes.

    The breakthrough in the Abu brothers’ case finally came after a tip from a man who had recognized one of their relatives in the Palorinya camp, a scattered settlement of 180,000 refugees. Red Cross representatives asked the prime minister’s office — which oversees the refugee program in partnership with the United Nations refugee agency — to run a check for their mother. The search revealed nine people with similar names. A Red Cross tracer then set out to locate each woman, one by one, and found the correct Raida Ijo on the fifth attempt.
    EDITORS’ PICKS
    What Happens to #MeToo When a Feminist Is the Accused?
    The Scientist Who Scrambled Darwin’s Tree of Life
    Beto O’Rourke Dreams of One Texas. Ted Cruz Sees Another Clearly.

    On June 29, more than a year and a half after they last saw their mother, the boys packed their few possessions — clothes, cooking pots, jerrycans, a single rolled-up mattress, three live rabbits — into a Red Cross vehicle and set off on the two-hour drive from their foster home in Rhino camp, to their mother’s ramshackle shelter of sticks, mud and thatch in Palorinya.

    “For a mother not to know where her children are is so hard,” said an overjoyed Mrs. Ijo, who had spent days sitting in an open sided tarpaulin shelter worrying about her missing sons since fleeing to Uganda during a second round of violence in February 2017. “They came from my body. I brought them up. I love them. I didn’t know if I would ever see them again.”

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/09/world/africa/south-sudan-refugee-children-uganda.html

  • The missing reports on herbicides in Gaza
    Amira Hass Jul 09, 2018 1:05 AM | Haaretz.com
    https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-the-missing-reports-on-herbicides-in-gaza-1.6248503

    So we’re destroying Palestinian crops with our spraying? What’s new here, shrugs the average Israeli and clicks to another channel

    As I was working on my article about Israeli herbicide spraying in Gaza, I learned that 1948 refugees from the village of Salama are living in the village of Khuza’a. They are farmers, much as their parents and grandparents were. Back then, they grew citrus fruit, bananas and grains, and sold their crops in Jaffa as well as in Jewish communities.

    We tend to associate Palestinian refugees with the refugee camps. But sometimes you get to meet some who, even in exile from their village, have managed to maintain the same type of life and livelihood – that is, to work and live off the land in the West Bank and even Gaza. The Al-Najjar family in Khuza’a is one such family.

    Together with his father, Saleh al-Najjar, 53, works 60 dunams (about 15 acres) of land that they are leasing in Khuza’a. They employ three laborers, and Saleh says the five of them work 12 hours a day.

    By working the land they maintain continuity, despite being refugees and having lost the lands of Salama – where Israel built Kfar Shalem. Israel, meanwhile, maintains the continuity by damaging their sources of income and their health. When people say the Nakba never ended, the Najjar family can be cited as another example. One of the millions.

    Over the past four years, the Najjars – like hundreds of other farming families in the eastern part of the Gaza Strip – have learned to fear also small civilian aircraft.

    In spring and fall, and sometimes in winter too, for several days the planes appear in the mornings, flying above the separation fence. But the contrails they emit are borne westward with the wind, cross the border and reach the Gazan fields. From seeing their wilted crops, the farmers have understood that the planes are spraying herbicides.

    The fear of these crop dusters is even greater than of the Israeli armored vehicles that every so often trample all the vegetation west of the separation fence – because the herbicides reach further, seep into the soil and pollute the water. Crops up to 2,200 meters (7,220 feet) west of the border fence are affected by the spraying, says the Red Cross. The crops 100 to 900 meters away were totally destroyed. The irrigation pools located a kilometer away were contaminated.

    The Palestinian reports about Israeli crop spraying destroying Gaza agriculture were first heard in late 2014. A figment of the imagination? In late 2015, the Israel Defense Forces spokesperson confirmed to the 972 website that crop spraying was taking place. The Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, an organization in Gaza, sent soil samples for laboratory testing. The army did not tell it what was being sprayed.

    Spraying of herbicides intended to destroy crops is not the sort of thing the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit or the Coordinator of Government Activity in the Territories is happy to talk about or volunteer information on. Nor is it the kind of report that concerns Israelis much, not on social media or as a common subject of conversation in Israeli homes.

    “So we’re destroying Palestinian crops with herbicide spraying – what else is new? We did the same thing to the Bedouin crops in the Negev (before the High Court of Justice outlawed it following a petition by Adala) and with the lands of Akraba in the 1970s. If our fine young men have decided to do it, it must be necessary,” shrugs the ordinary Israeli before clicking to the next channel. That is why I’m trying to return to the previous channel.

    The IDF’s Gaza Division decides; the Defense Ministry pays the civil aviation companies to do it. The seared spinach fields and the withered parsley plants prey on my mind. Also, I think about the children of these pilots: Do they know the wind carries the chemicals their daddy sprayed, and that another daddy can’t buy his kids shoes and other things because of the crops that were destroyed due to it?

    Asked to comment, the Defense Ministry says: “The spraying is carried out by properly authorized companies in accordance with the 1956 law regarding the protection of plants.” It’s true that the two civilian companies that fly crop dusters above the border fence – Chim-Nir and Telem Aviation – are recognized professionals in the field. The Defense Ministry also says: “The crop dusting is identical to that which is done throughout Israel.”

    Whoever wrote that sentence is either demeaning the intelligence of his Israeli readers, or confident that they will take his word for it and not be concerned. Both are correct.

    The Defense Ministry only revealed what the “identical” herbicides being used are in response to an inquiry from Gisha, the Legal Center for Freedom of Movement, based on the freedom of information law. The chemicals are glyphosate, oxyfluorfen and diuron.

    Despite the numerous findings about the environmental and health hazards posed by glyphosate, it is still in use in Israel. But the Defense Ministry spokesperson ignores the fact that even with all the debate about how harmful these substances are to the environment and to people’s health, their purpose is to help safeguard farmers’ livelihoods – not to destroy their crops, as we are doing in Gaza.

    The IDF and the Defense Ministry know these sprayed chemicals don’t recognize borders. The systematic damage to Palestinian crops through spraying is not an accident. It is deliberate. Another form of warfare against the health and welfare of Palestinians, and all under the worn-out blanket of security.

    #GAZA #herbicides

    • La guerre agricole ou comment Israël se sert de substances chimiques pour tuer les récoltes à Gaza
      Amira Hass | Publié le 6/7/2018 sur Haaretz | Traduction : Jean-Marie Flémal
      http://www.pourlapalestine.be/la-guerre-agricole-ou-comment-israel-se-sert-de-substances-chimiques

      Les photographies de véhicules blindés de l’armée déracinant et broyant arbres et végétation dans la bande de Gaza ne sont pas étrangères, aux yeux des Israéliens, mais ce qu’ils savent beaucoup moins, c’est que, depuis 2014, des champs palestiniens sont également détruits via l’usage d’herbicides déversés depuis les airs – comme cela a d’abord été publié sur le site internet 972. Officiellement, la pulvérisation ne se fait que du côté israélien de la clôture mais, comme en ont témoigné des fermiers palestiniens de l’autre côté, avec confirmation de la Croix-Rouge, les dégâts qui en résultent peuvent être perçus très loin dans le territoire palestinien même.

      « La pulvérisation par les airs n’est effectuée que sur le territoire de l’État d’Israël, le long de l’obstacle sécuritaire à la frontière de la bande de Gaza », a fait savoir le ministère de la Défense à Haaretz. « Elle est effectuée par des sociétés d’épandage munies d’une autorisation légale, en conformité avec les dispositions de la Loi sur la protection des plantes (5716-1956) et les réglementations qui en découlent, et elle est identique à la pulvérisation aérienne effectuée partout dans l’État d’Israël. »

      Le porte-parole des FDI 1 a déclaré : « L’épandage est réalisé à l’aide du matériel standard utilisé en Israël et dans d’autres pays ; cela provoque un dépérissement de la végétation existante et empêche les mauvaises herbes de pousser. L’épandage s’effectue près de la clôture et ne pénètre pas dans la bande de Gaza. »

      Toutefois, le matériel standard utilisé en Israël a pour but d’aider les fermiers à faire pousser leurs cultures de rapport. À Gaza, il les détruit.

  • The Rise and Fall Of the Watusi - The New York Times
    https://www.nytimes.com/1964/02/23/the-rise-and-fall-of-the-watusi.html
    En 1964 le New York Times publie un article sur l’extermination imminente des Tutsi. C’est raconté comme une fatalité qui ne laisse pas de choix aux pauvres nègres victimes de forces plus grandes qu’eux. Dans cette optique il s’agit du destion inexorable du peuple des Tutsi arrivant à la fin de son règne sur le peuple des Hutu qui revendique ses droits. L’article contient quelques informations intéressantes déformées par la vison colonialiste de l’époque.

    ELSPETH HUXLEYFEB. 23, 1964

    FROM the miniature Republic of Rwanda in central Africa comes word of the daily slaughter of a thousand people, the possible extermin­ation of a quarter of a million men, women and children, in what has been called the bloodiest tragedy since Hitler turned on the Jews. The victims are those tall, proud and graceful warrior­aristocrats, the Tutsi, sometimes known as the Watusi.* They are being killed

    *According to the orthography of the Bantu language, “Tutsi” is the singular and “Watutsi” the plural form of the word. For the sake of simplicity. I prefer to follow the style used in United Nations reports and use “Tutsi” for both singular and plural.

    Who are the Tutsi and why is such a ghastly fate overtaking them? Is it simply African tribalism run riot, or are outside influences at work ? Can nothing be done?

    The king‐in‐exile of Rwanda, Mwamni (Monarch) Kigeri V, who has fled to the Congo, is the 41st in line of suc­cession. Every Tutsi can recite the names of his 40 predecessors but the Tutsi cannot say how many centuries ago their ancestors settled in these tumbled hills, deep valleys and vol­canic mountains separating the great

    Nor is it known just where they came from—Ethiopia perhaps; before that, possibly Asia. They are cattle folk, allied in race to such nomadic peo­ples as the Somali, Gatlla, Fulani and Masai. Driving their cattle before them, they found this remote pocket of cen­tral Africa, 1,000 miles from the In­dian Ocean. It was occupied by a race of Negro cultivators called the Hutu, who had themselves displaced the ab­original pygmy hunters, the Twa (or Batwa). First the Tutsi conquered and then ruled the Hutu. much as a ??r‐man ruling class conquered and settled

    In the latest census, the Tutsi con­stitute about 15 per cent of Rwanda’s population of between 2.5 and 3 mil­lion. Apart from a handful of Twa, the rest are Hutu. (The same figures are true of the tiny neighboring king­dom of Burundi.)

    For at least four centuries the Tutsi have kept intact their racial type by inbreeding. Once seen, these elongated men are never forgotten. Their small, narrow heads perched on top of slim and spindly bodies remind one of some of Henry Moore’s sculptures. Their average height, though well above the general norm, is no more than 5 feet 9 inches, but individuals reach more than 7 feet. The former king, Charles III Rudahagwa, was 6 feet 9 inches, and a famous dancer and high jumper—so famous his portrait was printed on the banknotes—measured 7 feet 5 inches.

    THIS height, prized as a badge of racial purity, the Tutsi accentuated by training upward tufts of fuzzy hair shaped like crescent moons. Their leaps, bounds and whirling dances delighted tourists, as their courtesy and polished manners impressed them.

    Through the centuries, Tutsi feudal­ism survived with only minor changes. At its center was the Mwami, believed to be descended from the god of lightning, whose three children fell from heaven onto a hilltop and begat the two royal clans from which the Mwami and his queen were always chosen. Not only had the Mwami rights of life and death over his subjects but, in theory, he owned all the cattle. too — magnificent, long‐horned cattle far superior to the weedy native African bovines. Once a year, these were ceremonially presented to the Mwami in all their glory — horns sand‐polished, coats rubbed with butter, foreheads hung with beads, each beast attended by a youth in bark‐cloth robes who spoke to it softly and caught its dung on a woven straw mat.

    “Rwanda has three pillars.” ran a Tutsi saying: “God, cows and soldiers.” The cows the Mwami distributed among his subchiefs, and they down the line to lesser fry, leaving no adult Tutsi male without cows.

    Indeed, the Tutsi cannot live with­out cattle, for milk and salted butter are their staple food. (Milk is con­sumed in curds; the butter, hot and perfumed by the bark of a certain tree.) To eat foods grown in soil, though often done, is thought vaguely shame­ful, something to be carried out in private.

    THE kingdom was divided into dis­tricts and each had not one governor, but two: a land chief (umunyabutaka) and a cattle chief (umuuyamukenke). The jealousy that nearly always held these two potentates apart prompted them to spy on each other to the Mwami, who was thus able to keep his barons from threatening his own au­thority.

    Below these governors spread a net­work of hill chiefs, and under them again the heads of families. Tribute — milk and butter from the lordly Tutsi, and

    Just as, in medieval Europe, every nobleman sent his son to the king’s court to learn the arts of war, love and civil­ity, so in Rwanda and Burundi did every Tutsi father send his sons to the Mwami’s court for instruction in the use of weapons, in lore and tradition, in dancing and poetry and the art of conversation, in manly sports and in the practice of the most prized Tutsi virtue —self‐control. Ill‐temper and the least display of emotion are thought shameful and vul­gar. The ideal Tutsi male is at all times polite, dignified, amiable, sparing of idle words and a trifle supercilious.

    THESE youths, gathered in the royal compound, were formed into companies which, in turn, formed the army. Each youth owed to his company commander an allegiance which continued all his life. In turn, the commander took the youth, and subsequently the man, under his protection. Every Tutsi could appeal from his hill chief to his army com­mander, who was bound to support him in lawsuits or other troubles. (During battle, no commander could step backward, lest . his army re­treat; at no time could the

    The Hutu were both bound and protected by a system known as buhake, a form of vassalage. A Hutu wanting to enter into this relationship would present a jug of beer to a Tutsi and say: “I ask you for milk. Make me rich. Be my father, and I will be your child.” If the Tutsi agreed, he gave the applicant a cow, or several cows. This sealed the bargain­

    The Hutu then looked to his lord for protection and for such help as contributions to­ward the bride‐price he must proffer for a wife. In return, the Hutu helped from time to time in the work of his pro­tector’s household, brought oc­casional jugs of beer and held himself available for service

    The densely populated king­doms of the Tutsi lay squarely in the path of Arab slavers who for centuries pillaged throughout the central Afri­can highlands, dispatching by the hundreds of thou­sands yoked and helpless hu­man beings to the slave mar­kets of Zanzibar and the Persian Gulf. Here the explor­er Livingstone wrote despair­ingly in his diaries of coffles (caravans) of tormented cap­tives, of burnt villages, slaugh­tered children, raped women and ruined crops. But these little kingdoms, each about the size of Maryland, escaped. The disciplined, courageous Tutsi spearmen kept the Arabs out, and the Hutu safe. Feudalism worked both ways.

    Some Hutu grew rich, and even married their patrons’ daughters. Sexual morality was strict. A girl who became pregnant before marriage was either killed outright or aban­doned on an island in the mid­dle of Lake Kivu to perish, unless rescued by a man of a despised and primitive Congo tribe, to be kept as a beast of burden with no rights.

    SINCE the Tutsi never tilled the soil, their demands for labor were light. Hutu duties included attendance on the lord during his travels; carry­ing messages; helping to re­pair the master’s compound; guarding his cows. The reia­tionsiiip could be ended at any time by either party. A patron had no right to hold an unwilling “client” in his service.

    It has been said that serf­dom in Europe was destroyed by the invention of the horse

    UNTIL the First World War the kingdoms were part of German East Africa. Then Bel­gium took them over, under the name of Ruanda‐Urundi, as a trust territory, first for the League of Nations, then under the U. N. Although the Belgian educational system, based on Roman Catholic mis­sions, was conservative in out­look, and Belgian adminis­trators made no calculated attempt to undo Tutsi feudal­ism, Western ideas inevitably crept in. So did Western eco­nomic notions through the in­troduction of coffee cultiva­tion, which opened to the Hutu a road to independence, by­passing the Tutsi cattle‐based economy. And Belgian authori­ty over Tutsi notables, even over the sacred Mwami him­self, inevitably damaged their prestige. The Belgians even de­posed one obstructive Mwami. About ten years ago, the Belgians tried to persuade the Tutsi to let some of the Hutu into their complex structure of government. In Burundi, the Tutsi ruling caste realized its cuanger just in time and agreed to share some of its powers with the Hutu majority. But in Rwanda, until the day the system toppled, no Hutu was appointed by the Tatsi over­lords to a chief’s position. A tight, rigid, exclusive Tutsi aristocracy continued to rule the land.

    The Hutu grew increasingly

    WHEN order was restored, there were reckoned to be 21,­000 Tutsi refugees in Burundi, 14,000 in Tanganyika, 40,000 in Uganda and 60,000 in the Kivu province of the Con­go. The Red Cross did its best to cope in camps improvised by local governments.

    Back in Rwanda, municipal elections were held for the first time—and swept the Hutu into power. The Parmehutu —Parti d’Emancipation des Hu­tus—founded only in October 1959, emerged on top, formed a coalition government, and after some delays proclaimed a republic, to which the Bel­gians, unwilling to face a colonial war, gave recognition in terms of internal self‐gov­ernment.

    In 1962, the U.N. proclaimed Belgium’s trusteeship at an end, and, that same year, a general election held under U.N. supervision confirmed the Hutu triumph. With full in­dependence, a new chapter be­gan — the Hutu chapter.

    Rwanda and Burundi split. Burundi has the only large city, Usumbura (population: 50,000), as its capital. With a mixed Tutsi‐Hutu govern­ment, it maintains an uneasy peace. It remains a kingdom, with a Tutsi monarch. Every­one knows and likes the jovial Mwami, Mwambutsa IV, whose height is normal, whose rule

    As its President, Rwanda chose Grégoire Kayibanda, a 39‐year‐old Roman Catholic seminarist who, on the verge of ordination, chose politics in­stead. Locally educated by the Dominicans, he is a protégé of the Archbishop of Rwanda whose letter helped spark the first Hutu uprising. Faithful to his priestly training, he shuns the fleshpots, drives a Volkswagen instead of the Rolls or Mercedes generally favored by an African head of state and, suspicious of the lure of wicked cities, lives on a hilltop outside the town of Kigali, said to be the smallest capital city in the world, with some 7,000 inhabitants, a sin­gle paved street, no hotels, no telephone and a more or less permanent curfew.

    Mr. Kayibanda’s Christian and political duties, as he sees them, have fused into an im­placable resolve to destroy for­ever the last shreds of Tutsi power—if necessary by obliter­ating the entire Tutsi race. Last fall, Rwanda still held between 200,000 and 250,000 Tutsi, reinforced by refugees drifting back from the camps, full of bitterness and humilia­tion. In December, they were joined by bands of Tutsi spear­men from Burundi, who with the courage of despair, and outnumbered 10 to 1, attacked the Hutu. Many believe they were egged on by Mwami Ki­geri V, who since 1959 had been fanning Tutsi racial prideand calling for revenue.

    THE result of the attacks was to revive all the cumula­tive hatred of the Tutsi for past injustices. The winds of anti‐colonialism sweeping Af­rica do not distinguish be­tween white and black colo­nialists. The Hutu launched a ruthless war of extermina­tion that is still going on. Tut­si villages are stormed and their inhabitants clubbed or hacked to death, burned alive or herded into crocodile‐infest­ed rivers.

    What will become of the Tutsi? One urgent need is out­side help for the Urundi Gov­ernment in resettling the masses of refugees who have fled to its territory. Urundi’s mixed political set‐up is rea­sonably democratic, if not al­ways peaceful (witness the assassination of the Crown Prince by a political opponent

    In a sense the Tutsi have brought their tragic fate on themselves. They are paying now the bitter price of ostrich­ism, a stubborn refusal to move with the times. The Bourbons of Africa, they are meeting the Bourbon destiny—to be obliterated by the people they have ruled and patron­ized.

    The old relationship could survive no longer in a world, as E. M. Forster has described it, of “telegrams and anger;” a world of bogus democracy turning into one‐party states, of overheated U.N. assemblies, of press reports and dema­gogues, a world where (as in the neighboring Congo) a for­mer Minister of Education leads bands of tribesmen armed with arrows to mutilate women missionaries.

    THE elegant and long‐legged Tutsi with their dances and their epic poetry, their lyre­horned cattle and superb bas­ketwork and code of seemly behavior, had dwindled into tourist fodder. The fate of all species, institutions or individ­uais who will not, or cannot. adapt caught up with them. Those who will not bend must break.

    For the essence of the situ­ation in an Africa increasingly

    NOW, not just the white men have gone, or are going; far more importantly, the eld­ers and their authority, the whole chain of command from ancestral spirits, through the chief and his council to the obedient youth are being swept away. This hierarchy is being replaced by the “young men,” the untried, unsettled, uncer­tain, angry and confused gen­eration who, with a thin ve­neer of ill‐digested Western education, for the first time in Africa’s long history have taken over power from their fathers.

    It is a major revolution in­deed, whose first results are only just beginning to show up and whose outcome cannot be seen. There is only one safe prediction: that it will be vio­lent, unpredictable, bloody and cruel, as it is proving for the doomed Tutsi of Rwanda.

    #Ruanda #Burundi #histoire #Tutsi #Congo

  • 70 years since the Deir Yassin Massacre. On April 9, 1948, Zionist militias, Irgun and Lehi (a.k.a Stern Gang), attacked the village of Deir Yassin, killing over 100 people including women and children. Reports stated that the residents of the small village were mutilated, decapitated, disemboweled and raped.

    In an article published recently by Israeli newspaper Haaretz, hidden evidence and shocking new testimonies regarding the massacre have been released.

    Neta Shoshani, an Israeli filmmaker who has been researching the history of the massacre, entitled her most recent film “Born in Deir Yassin”. Shoshani interviewed and gathered testimonies from people who were present during the massacre, and evidence from Israeli archives that are hidden from the public.

    She showed the evidence to the Israeli Newspaper Haaretz. The film shows “A young fellow tied to a tree and set on fire. A woman and an old man shot in the back. Girls lined up against a wall and shot with a submachine gun.”

    Among those who testified was Yehuda Feder, former member of Lehi. “In the village I killed an armed Arab man and two Arab girls of 16 or 17. I stood them against a wall and blasted them with two rounds from the Tommy gun.” He told Shoshani, adding “We confiscated a lot of money and silver and gold jewelry fell into our hands.”

    Former Jerusalem commander of Lehi, Yehoshua Zettler, said “They took dead people, piled them up and burned them.”, and described the residents of the village saying “they ran like cats.” The attackers cut through the village using explosives, blowing up houses, and “within a few hours, half the village wasn’t there any more” said Zettler.

    Mordechai Gichon, before he died last year was a lieutenant colonel in the Israeli army; a Haganah intelligence officer at the time. He was sent to Deir Yassin after the massacre. “When the Cossacks burst into Jewish neighborhoods, then that should have looked something like this,” he said - comparing Deir Yassin to Jewish pogroms. “My impression was more of a massacre than anything else. If it is a matter of killing innocent civilians, then it can be called a massacre.” He told Shoshani.

    Yair Tsaban, a member of the Youth Brigades at the time, was sent to bury the corpses in fear of the Red Cross showing up “at any moment, and it was necessary to blur the traces [of the killings] because publication of pictures and testimonies about what had happened in the village would be very damaging to the image of our War of Independence.”
    Read more: Israeli historian uncovers hidden Palestinian history

    https://www.welcometopalestine.com/article/israeli-filmmaker-uncovers-evidence-deir-yassin-massacre

    #DeirYassinMassacre #DeirYassin #Palestine

  • Alerte #santé_publique
    https://www.globalhealthnow.org

    Je me suis abonné avec le temps à des tas de newsletters et de flus rss pour suivre les questions de santé publique. Beaucoup trop, et désormais la newsletter GHN semble me donner tout ce dont j’ai besoin (et même sans doute trop).

    Exemple ce matin :

    Reservoir Dogs
    A vaccine used to treat dogs with leishmaniasis could help stop the disease’s spread to humans, University of Iowa researchers found.

    The strain of Uganda’s cholera outbreak is compounded by the flood of 70,000 Congolese refugees who’ve arrived this year, sharing crowded quarters where disease spreads easily. The International Federation of Red Cross

    Some recruiters make birth control mandatory for Sri Lankan women seeking work in the Middle East, desperate to support their families amid civil war at home. The Guardian

    Ireland’s measles outbreak has swelled to 40 confirmed cases after beginning in Limerick in January; an outbreak control team has been deployed. TheJournal.ie

    Over 200 previously unknown viruses found in fish, frogs and reptiles have been unveiled by researchers; they date back hundreds of millions of years to the advent of modern animals. Nature

    A Harder Death for People with Intellectual Disabilities – The New York Times

    Facebook sent a doctor on a secret mission to ask hospitals to share patient data – CNBC

    2018 March for Science will be far more than street protests – Science

    Clinical trials may be based on flimsy animal data – Science

    How The NRA Worked To Stifle Gun Violence Research – NPR’s Here & Now

    Negative fateful life events and the brains of middle-aged men – University of California - San Diego via ScienceDaily

    Solving Japan’s Fertility Crisis – IPS

    In Detroit, Baby Steps to Better Births – US News

    Why I did a vasectomy: Kerala man’s post on family planning is a must-read – The News Minute

    Taboo talk in Mali marriages overlaps with healthy choices – Futurity

    The Controversial Process of Redesigning the Wheelchair Symbol – Atlas Obscura

    #veille #ressources

  • Soutien aux réfugiés en #Grèce : octroi d’une #aide_d'urgence de 180 millions d’euros

    La Commission européenne a annoncé aujourd’hui l’octroi d’un nouveau #financement de 180 millions d’euros pour des projets d’aide en Grèce, visant notamment à étendre le programme phare d’« #aide_d'urgence_à_l'intégration_à_l'hébergement » (#ESTIA) destiné à aider les réfugiés à trouver un #logement en zone urbaine et à l’extérieur des camps ainsi qu’à leur fournir une aide régulière en espèces.

    Ce financement intervient alors que le commissaire chargé de l’aide humanitaire et de la gestion des crises, Christos Stylianides, rencontrait aujourd’hui le Premier ministre grec, Alexis Tsipras, à Athènes.

    Le programme ESTIA, lancé en juillet 2017 avec le Haut-Commissariat des Nations unies pour les réfugiés (HCR), est la plus grande opération d’aide menée par l’UE dans le pays, en cohérence avec la politique du gouvernement grec visant à sortir les réfugiés des camps. Jusqu’à présent, il a permis de créer plus de 23 000 places d’hébergement urbain et de mettre en place un système d’assistance pécuniaire en espèces pour plus de 41 000 réfugiés et demandeurs d’asile.

    « Les programmes humanitaires que nous avons déployés en Grèce en faveur des réfugiés témoignent clairement de la solidarité européenne. Nous restons fermement déterminés à aider les réfugiés en Grèce à mener une vie plus sûre, plus normale et plus digne ainsi qu’à faciliter leur intégration dans l’économie locale et dans la société. Grâce à notre programme ESTIA, nous parvenons à améliorer concrètement la vie des gens. Je souhaite tout particulièrement rendre hommage aux citoyens et aux maires grecs qui ont accueilli des réfugiés dans leur municipalité en leur manifestant une grande attention et de l’empathie » a déclaré M. Christos Stylianides, commissaire chargé de l’aide humanitaire et de la gestion des crises.

    Six autres contrats ont été signés avec le Conseil danois pour les réfugiés, l’Arbeiter-Samariter-Bund, Médecins du Monde, la Croix-Rouge espagnole ainsi que les ONG grecques METAdrasi et Smile of the Child, pour répondre aux besoins humanitaires urgents en Grèce, notamment en matière d’abris, de soins de santé primaires, d’aide psychosociale, d’amélioration des conditions d’hygiène, d’éducation informelle et de services d’interprétation pour les soins de santé et la protection.

    Constituée de divers financements, l’aide globale mise à la disposition de la Grèce par la Commission européenne pour l’aider à gérer la situation humanitaire, la migration et les frontières extérieures dépasse 1,5 milliard d’euros.

    http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-2604_fr.htm
    #Europe #UE #EU #aide #hébergement #aide_financière

    • Migration : Commission steps up emergency assistance to Spain and Greece

      The European Commission has awarded an additional €45.6 million in emergency assistance to support Spain and Greece respond to the migratory challenges they face.

      In view of increased arrivals, Spain will receive €25.6 million to improve the reception capacity for arrivals at its southern coast and in Ceuta and Melilla as well as to help increase returns. Another €20 million has been awarded to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to improve reception conditions in Greece, notably on the island of Lesvos.

      Dimitris Avramopoulos, Commissioner for Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship said: “The Commission continues to deliver on its commitment to support Member States under pressure. Spain has seen arrival figures increase during the past year and we need to step up our support to help manage the numbers and return those who have no right to stay. And while the EU-Turkey Statement has greatly contributed to lowering the number of arrivals in Greece, the country is still facing significant migratory pressure, in particular on the islands. Over €1 billion has now been awarded in emergency assistance to help Member States manage migration.”

      With the new funding decisions an important milestone has been reached: In total, the Commission has now mobilised over €1 billion in emergency assistance to help manage migration under the current financial framework (2014-2020) – support that has gone to the Member States most affected such as Italy, Greece, Bulgaria, Croatia, Germany, Sweden and now also Spain.

      Spain

      €24.8 million has been awarded to the Ministry of Employment and Social Security and the Spanish Red Cross for a project aimed at providing healthcare, food, and shelter to migrants arriving on the southern coast of Spain and in Ceuta and Melilla.
      A further €720,000 has been awarded to the Ministry of Interior to help improve the quality of return facilities and infrastructure for return transfers.

      The emergency funding awarded to Spain comes on top of €692 million allocated to Spain for migration, border and security management under national programmes for the period 2014-2020.

      Greece

      The additional €20 million awarded to the UNHCR will be used to help manage the reception facilities in the island of Lesvos, support local community projects and provide further emergency accommodation on the islands.
      It will also go towards stepping up measures for the protection of children, non-formal education and to prevent sexual and gender-based violence.

      This funding decision comes on top of more than €1.6 billion of funding support awarded by the Commission since 2015 to address migration challenges in Greece.

      http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-4342_en.htm
      #Espagne

    • Migration: Commission increases emergency assistance for Spain to €30 million [Updated on 3/8/2018 at 13:01]

      Yesterday, the Commission awarded an additional €3 million in emergency assistance under the #Internal_Security_Fund (#ISF) to support Spain in responding to the recent migratory pressure. The assistance will mainly support the costs linked to the deployment of extra staff from the Guardia Civil to the southern borders of Spain. This support brings to €30 million the emergency funding awarded to Spain since July to help the country address migratory challenges. This financial assistance comes on top of €691.7 million allocated to Spain under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) and the Internal Security Fund (ISF) national programme 2014-2020. (For more information: Natasha Bertaud – Tel.: +32 229 67456; Katarzyna Kolanko – Tel.: +32 299 63444)

      http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_MEX-18-4834_en.htm

    • Avramopoulos in Spain to announce further EU support to tackle migration

      As Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos headed to Madrid, the European Commission announced Friday (3 August) a further €3 million in emergency aid to support Spanish border guards in curbing irregular migration.

      The new cash comes from the Internal Security Fund and aims to help cover the costs linked to the deployment of extra staff in the southern borders of Spain.

      In July this year, the EU executive awarded €24.8 million to the Ministry of Employment and Social Security and the Spanish Red Cross to enhance reception capabilities, health assistance, food and shelter for migrants arriving through the Western Mediterranean route.

      A further €720,000 went to the Ministry of Interior to help improve the quality of return and transfer facilities in the south of Spain, Ceuta and Melilla.

      This financial assistance comes on top of €691.7 million allocated to Spain under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund and the Internal Security Fund since 2014.

      https://www.euractiv.com/section/justice-home-affairs/news/avramopoulos-in-spain-to-announce-further-eu-support-to-tackle-migration/?_ga=2.232982942.1049233813.1533558974-1514184901.1489527159

    • Migration : Commission provides €24.1 million to the International Organisation for Migration to provide support, help and education for migrant children in Greece

      The European Commission has awarded €24.1 million in emergency assistance under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) to support Greece in responding to migratory challenges. The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) will receive the funding to help ensure that migrant children can be immediately placed in a protective environment and receive education. It will notably support child-adequate accommodation, medical and psychological support, interpretation and cultural mediation as well as food provision for up to 1,200 unaccompanied minors in the Greek islands and in the mainland and facilitate formal education by providing transport and school kits. In addition, the funding will help assist migrants registered for assisted voluntary return and reintegration programmes. Today’s funding decision comes on top of more than €1.6 billion of funding support awarded by the Commission since 2015 to address migration challenges in Greece. Under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) and the Internal Security Fund (ISF), Greece has now been awarded €482.2 million in emergency funding, in addition to €561 million already awarded under these funds for the Greek national programme 2014-2020.

      v. aussi :


      https://ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/sites/homeaffairs/files/what-we-do/policies/european-agenda-migration/20181010_managing-migration-eu-financial-support-to-greece_en.pdf

    • EC provides 43.7 million euros to increase migrant reception capacity in mainland Greece

      The European Commission has awarded an additional 43.7 million euros in emergency assistance to the International Organization for Migration (#IOM) to support Greece in responding to migratory challenges, the EU’s executive body said Wednesday.

      The grant, which comes from the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund, is designed to support the provision of emergency shelter for up to 6,000 asylum seekers and refugees by rapidly establishing places in temporary accommodation facilities, the Commission said.

      “The funding aims to provide dignified accommodation as well as basic assistance and protection services to the most vulnerable migrants in Greece, especially in view of the upcoming winter months and the need to decongest reception facilities on the Greek islands,” it said.

      The Commission has awarded more than 1.6 billion euros in funding since 2015 to address migratory challenges in Greece.

      http://www.ekathimerini.com/234665/article/ekathimerini/news/ec-provides-437-million-euros-to-increase-migrant-reception-capacity-i
      #OIM

    • Migration et #frontières : la Commission octroie 305 millions d’euros supplémentaires aux États membres sous pression

      Cette semaine, la Commission européenne a débloqué une enveloppe supplémentaire de 305 millions d’euros d’aide d’urgence afin de soutenir la #Grèce, l’#Italie, #Chypre et la #Croatie dans le domaine de la gestion des migrations et des frontières.

      Ces moyens financiers soutiendront les efforts déployés pour accroître les capacités d’#accueil, protéger les victimes de la traite des êtres humains et renforcer les capacités de surveillance et de #gestion_des_frontières.

      M. Dimitris Avramopoulos, commissaire pour la migration, les affaires intérieures et la citoyenneté, a déclaré à cette occasion : « La Commission est résolue à continuer de soutenir les États membres soumis à une #pression_migratoire. Les 305 millions d’euros supplémentaires attribués cette semaine à plusieurs pays permettront de répondre à des besoins urgents, en faisant en sorte que les nouveaux migrants arrivés dans ces pays soient hébergés convenablement et reçoivent de la #nourriture et de l’#eau, que la #sûreté et la #sécurité des personnes les plus vulnérables soient garanties et que les #contrôles_aux_frontières soient renforcés, si nécessaire. »

      Ce #financement_d'urgence, qui sera accordé au titre du Fonds « Asile, migration et intégration » (#AMIF) et du #Fonds_pour_la_sécurité_intérieure (#FSI) de la Commission, constitue une partie des 10,8 milliards d’euros déjà mobilisés par la Commission en faveur de la gestion des migrations et des frontières et de la sécurité intérieure pour la période 2014-2020.

      Grèce

      La Commission débloque 289 millions d’euros pour soutenir la gestion des migrations en Grèce. Cette enveloppe sera répartie comme suit :

      Hébergements locatifs et allocations : 190 millions d’euros seront versés au Haut-Commissariat des Nations unies pour les réfugiés (#HCR) pour permettre la poursuite du programme #ESTIA (#aide_d'urgence_à_l'intégration_et_à_l'hébergement). Ce programme fournit des #logements en location permettant d’accueillir jusqu’à 25 000 demandeurs d’asile et réfugiés et distribue des #allocations mensuelles en espèces pour un maximum de 70 000 personnes. Le HCR recevra également un autre montant de 5 millions d’euros afin d’augmenter encore la capacité d’#accueil dans les nouveaux #centres_d'accueil ouverts en Grèce continentale, en mettant à disposition et en distribuant 400 conteneurs préfabriqués.
      Conditions d’accueil : 61 millions d’euros iront à l’Organisation internationale pour les migrations (#OIM) et au Fonds international de secours à l’enfance des Nations unies (#UNICEF), pour permettre la poursuite des programmes d’appui sur le terrain dans les centres d’accueil en Grèce continentale. Ces programmes englobent l’#accès_aux_soins de santé et à l’#éducation non formelle, la création de zones de sécurité spécifiques pour les #mineurs_non_accompagnés, ainsi que des formations destinées au personnel opérationnel.
      Recherche et sauvetage : 33 millions d’euros destinés aux garde-côtes grecs permettront de couvrir une partie des frais de fonctionnement afférents aux activités de connaissance de la situation maritime en mer Égée et contribueront à assurer des débarquements sûrs et une prise en charge efficiente des migrants à la suite d’opérations de recherche et sauvetage.
      Adaptation aux conditions hivernales : l’OIM recevra, pour soutenir ses préparatifs, 357 000 euros supplémentaires afin de fournir des couvertures, des vestes d’hiver et des kits d’hivernage dans les infrastructures d’accueil sur les îles grecques et dans la région de l’Évros.

      La Commission a mis plus de 2 milliards d’euros à la disposition de la Grèce pour la gestion des migrations, dont près de 1,5 milliard d’euros à titre d’aide financière d’urgence (voir la fiche d’information pour en savoir plus).

      Italie

      La Commission octroie 5,3 millions d’euros d’aide financière d’urgence aux autorités italiennes pour contribuer à protéger les victimes de la traite des êtres humains dans le contexte migratoire. Dans le cadre d’un projet pilote mené dans des centres d’hébergement de demandeurs d’asile dans la région du Piémont, le financement servira à identifier les victimes de la traite des êtres humains et à les encourager à recourir aux possibilités d’assistance à leur disposition.

      Depuis le début de la crise migratoire, la Commission a mis à disposition près de 950 millions d’euros pour soutenir la gestion des migrations et des frontières en Italie. Ce financement comprend un montant de plus de 225 millions d’euros d’aide d’urgence et 724 millions d’euros déjà alloués à l’Italie au titre de ses programmes nationaux relevant du Fonds « Asile, migration et intégration » et du Fonds pour la sécurité intérieure 2014-2020 (voir la fiche d’information pour en savoir plus).

      Chypre

      La Commission accorde 3,1 millions d’euros à Chypre pour que ce pays renforce sa capacité d’accueil et transforme le centre d’urgence temporaire « #Pournaras » en un centre de premier accueil à part entière. Grâce à ce financement, le centre deviendra un centre de formalités universel pouvant fonctionner 24 heures sur 24 et 7 jours sur 7. Les services assurés sur place comprendront l’examen médical, l’#enregistrement, le relevé des #empreintes_digitales, le #filtrage, la fourniture d’informations et la possibilité de présenter une demande d’asile.

      L’aide d’urgence s’inscrit dans le cadre des efforts déployés par la Commission pour renforcer l’appui à la gestion des migrations en faveur de Chypre, après l’augmentation considérable du nombre d’arrivées que ce pays a connue au cours de l’année 2018. Ce nouveau financement vient s’ajouter à près de 40 millions d’euros alloués à la gestion des migrations pour la période 2014-2020, et à près de 1 million d’euros d’aide d’urgence alloué en 2014 pour les questions migratoires. Le Bureau européen d’appui en matière d’asile déploie actuellement 29 agents chargés de dossiers afin d’aider Chypre à résorber l’arriéré de demandes d’asile consécutif à l’augmentation des arrivées au cours des dernières années.

      Croatie

      La Commission accorde 6,8 millions d’euros à la Croatie pour aider ce pays à renforcer la gestion des frontières extérieures de l’UE, dans le strict respect des règles de l’UE. Cette enveloppe permettra de renforcer la surveillance des frontières et les capacités des services répressifs, en couvrant les coûts opérationnels (indemnités journalières, compensation des heures supplémentaires et équipements) de dix postes de police des frontières. Un mécanisme de suivi sera mis en place afin de faire en sorte que toutes les mesures appliquées aux frontières extérieures de l’UE soient proportionnées et respectent pleinement les droits fondamentaux et la législation de l’Union en matière d’asile.

      Le montant octroyé aujourd’hui porte l’aide d’urgence totale en faveur de la gestion des migrations et des frontières allouée à la Croatie par la Commission à près de 23,2 millions d’euros. Cette somme s’ajoute à près de 108 millions d’euros alloués à la Croatie au titre des programmes nationaux relevant du Fonds « Asile, migration et intégration » et du Fonds pour la sécurité intérieure 2014-2020.

      Contexte

      Le soutien opérationnel et financier de l’Union joue un rôle déterminant pour aider les États membres à relever les défis migratoires depuis 2015.

      Le soutien de l’UE a également pris la forme d’une aide financière sans précédent accordée au titre du budget de l’UE à des partenaires – non seulement des autorités nationales, mais aussi des organisations internationales et des organisations non gouvernementales. En plus des dotations initiales pour la période 2014-2020 s’élevant à 6,9 milliards d’euros pour le Fonds « Asile, migration et intégration » (AMIF) et le Fonds pour la sécurité intérieure (#FSI_frontières_et_police), un montant supplémentaire de 3,9 milliards d’euros a été mobilisé en faveur de la gestion des migrations et des frontières et de la sécurité intérieure, pour atteindre 10,8 milliards d’euros.

      En outre, tirant les leçons de l’expérience, et compte tenu du fait que la gestion des migrations et des frontières demeurera un défi à l’avenir, la Commission a également proposé d’augmenter fortement les financements en la matière au titre du prochain budget de l’UE pour la période 2021-2027.

      http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-18-6884_fr.htm
      #traite_d'êtres_humains #surveillance_des_frontières #santé #MNA #IOM #Evros #Fonds_Asile_migration_et_intégration #tri #catégorisation

  • Puerto Rico’s streets crawl with heavily armed, masked mercenaries bearing no insignia or nametags
    https://boingboing.net/2017/10/15/katrina-rerun.html

    Though Puerto Rican law prohibits ownership and bearing of most long-guns and especially semiautomatic weapons, the streets of the stricken US colony now throng with mercenaries in tactical gear bearing such arms, their faces masked. They wear no insignia or nametags and won’t say who they work for, apart from vague statements in broken Spanish: “We work with the government. It’s a humanitarian mission, we’re helping Puerto Rico.”

    Rosa Emilia Rodríguez, head of Puerto Rico’s Federal Prosecutor’s Office, initially dismissed reports of the mercenaries, then, after reporters from the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo pressed her she said she’d “check it out.”

    After Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, Erik Prince’s Blackwater mercenaries flooded the city again, turning it into an “armed camp”, after Brigadier Gen. Gary Jones, commander of the Louisiana National Guard’s Joint Task Force announced “This place is going to look like Little Somalia. We’re going to go out and take this city back. This will be a combat operation to get this city under control.”

    Erik Prince is now reportedly considering a senate run as a Trumpist candidate in Wyoming. His sister, Betsy Devos, has used millions from her husband’s pyramid-scheme fortunes to fund efforts to destroy public education, and now serves as Trump’s Secretary of Education.

    Though the mercenaries in Puerto Rico won’t identify their employers, there’s good evidence that Blackwater (now called Academi) is or will soon be operating there, as well as other notorious mercenary gangs like Ranger America and the Whitestone Group.

    Security firm Academi —known by its former name, Blackwater, which won $21 million contract with the U.S. government to provide security services during the Iraq war in 2003— said that they already have offers from the local and federal government and by the Red Cross to come to Puerto Rico.

    “We’re ready to go,” said Paul Donahue, Chief Operating Officer of Constellis, Academi’s parent company, in a phone interview with the CPI. He explained that if the government of Puerto Rico accepts the proposal made by Academi to respond to the government’s offer, they would be providing security services for water transportation. The company already operates in the Caribbean islands of Dominica and St. Martin, where they arrived after Hurricanes Irma and Maria made landfall. This company, described as an army of mercenaries by investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill, has changed its name three times since its founding in 1997 by a former Navy Seal Officer (United States Marine, Air and Land Teams.)

  • ITF: Right Wing Anti-Immigration Group Dumps Ship’s Crew – gCaptain
    http://gcaptain.com/itf-right-wing-anti-immigration-group-dumps-ships-crew

    The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) says it is assisting the crew of the vessel #C_Star , who have been abandoned and left unpaid by its charterers, the right-wing youth group Defend Europe, according to the ITF. 

    The ship, currently in Barcelona, Spain, has been at the centre of Defend Europe’s “comic opera efforts” to block vessels rescuing refugees and migrants from sinking boats in the Mediterranean, the ITF said in a statement. 

    Oh, the irony. This group charters a British-owned, Mongolian flag of convenience ship, with a Sri Lankan crew to protest migration into Europe. Then abandons the crew in Europe,” said ITF seafarers’ section chair David Heindel.

    This so-called mission began as a farce, played out as a farce, and now it’s ended as a farce. Famously, the C Star was spurned at almost every stop it tried to make by local citizens and governments. Crew members have claimed asylum, and the ship has reportedly both been investigated on suspicion of people smuggling and had to call for help from one of the NGO search and rescue vessels it was supposedly blocking.

    This vessel has been like a clown car on water: overcrowded, comical, and, just like the ‘mission’ it was on, the doors quickly fell off. Sadly, it’s no surprise that the overgrown schoolboys behind it all have now abandoned the crew and left them to be looked after by the organizations they aimed to castigate, the Red Cross, the Spanish Coast Guard and the local maritime authorities,” Heinde added.

  • Red Cross chief visits besieged city on Yemen’s front lines | Lexington Herald Leader
    http://www.kentucky.com/living/health-and-medicine/article163246203.html

    The chief of the international Red Cross made a rare visit to the front lines in #Yemen Monday, taking a dirt road to reach the besieged western city of Taiz, devastated by more than two years of fighting.

    The visit by Peter Maurer, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross, is meant to provide the ICRC with a firsthand look at Yemen’s raging #cholera epidemic and humanitarian crisis amid the civil war. Maurer already visited the southern port city of Aden and will be ending his trip in Sanaa.

    The executive directors of UNICEF and WHO are also in Yemen to urge for much-needed humanitarian aid. The $2.1 billion humanitarian appeal for Yemen is only 33 percent funded, and the response to the cholera epidemic requires an additional $250 million, of which just $47 million has been received, according to the United Nations.

    Maurer posted a video showing him driving on unpaved roads to Taiz and tweeted: “The city is encircled and main roads are cut off.

    I find this needless suffering absolutely infuriating. The world is sleep-walking into yet more tragedy,” Maurer said on Sunday.

    #CICR

  • Record Numbers Of Venezuelans Seek Asylum In The U.S. Amid Political Chaos

    Some 8,300 Venezuelans applied for U.S. asylum in the first three months of 2017, which, as the Associated Press points out, puts the country on track to nearly double its record 18,155 requests last year. Around one in every five U.S. applicants this fiscal year is Venezuelan, making Venezuela America’s leading source of asylum claimants for the first time, surpassing countries like China and Mexico.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/political-chaos-sends-record-number-of-venezuelans-fleeing-to-us_us_
    #asile #migrations #réfugiés #réfugiés_vénézuéliens #USA #Etats-Unis #Venezuela

    • Colombie : violence et afflux de réfugiés vénézuéliens préoccupent l’UE

      La Colombie est confrontée à deux « situations humanitaires », en raison de l’afflux de réfugiés fuyant « la crise au Venezuela » et d’"un nouveau cycle de violence" de divers groupes armés, a dénoncé le commissaire européen Christos Stylianides.

      https://www.courrierinternational.com/depeche/colombie-violence-et-afflux-de-refugies-venezueliens-preoccup
      #Colombie

    • Half a million and counting: Venezuelan exodus puts new strains on Colombian border town

      The sun is burning at the Colombian border town of Cúcuta. Red Cross workers attend to people with dehydration and fatigue as hundreds of Venezuelans line up to have their passports stamped, covering their heads with clothing and cardboard to fashion what shade they can.

      https://www.irinnews.org/feature/2018/03/07/half-million-and-counting-venezuelan-exodus-puts-new-strains-colombian-bor

    • Venezuelans flee to Colombia to escape economic meltdown

      The Simon Bolivar bridge has become symbolic of the mass exodus of migrants from Venezuela. The crossing is also just one piece in the complex puzzle facing Colombia, as it struggles to absorb the increasing number of migrants prompted by its neighbour’s economic and social meltdown.

      Up to 45,000 migrants cross on foot from Venezuela to Cúcuta every day. The Colombian city has become the last hope for many fleeing Venezuela’s crumbling economy. Already four million people, out of a population of 30 million, have fled Venezuela due to chronic shortages of food and medicine.

      http://www.euronews.com/2018/03/26/colombia-s-venezuelan-migrant-influx

    • Venezolanos en Colombia: una situación que se sale de las manos

      La crisis venezolana se transformó en un éxodo masivo sin precedentes, con un impacto hemisférico que apenas comienza. Brasil y Colombia, donde recae el mayor impacto, afrontan un año electoral en medio de la polarización política, que distrae la necesidad de enfrentarla con una visión conjunta, estratégica e integral.


      http://pacifista.co/venezolanos-en-colombia-crisis-opinion

      via @stesummi

    • Hungry, sick and increasingly desperate, thousands of Venezuelans are pouring into Colombia

      For evidence that the Venezuelan migrant crisis is overwhelming this Colombian border city, look no further than its largest hospital.

      The emergency room designed to serve 75 patients is likely to be crammed with 125 or more. Typically, two-thirds are impoverished Venezuelans with broken bones, infections, trauma injuries — and no insurance and little cash.

      “I’m here for medicine I take every three months or I die,” said Cesar Andrade, a 51-year-old retired army sergeant from Caracas. He had come to Cucuta’s Erasmo Meoz University Hospital for anti-malaria medication he can’t get in Venezuela. “I’m starting a new life in Colombia. The crisis back home has forced me to do it.”

      The huge increase in Venezuelan migrants fleeing their country’s economic crisis, failing healthcare system and repressive government is affecting the Cucuta metropolitan area more than any other in Colombia. It’s where 80% of all exiting Venezuelans headed for Colombia enter as foreigners.

      Despite turning away Venezuelans with cancer or chronic diseases, the hospital treated 1,200 migrant emergency patients last month, up from the handful of patients, mostly traffic collision victims, in March 2015, before the Venezuelan exodus started gathering steam.

      The hospital’s red ink is rising along with its caseload. The facility has run up debts of $5 million over the last three years to accommodate Venezuelans because the Colombian government is unable to reimburse it, said Juan Agustin Ramirez, director of the 500-bed hospital.

      “The government has ordered us to attend to Venezuelan patients but is not giving us the resources to pay for them,” Ramirez said. “The truth is, we feel abandoned. The moment could arrive when we will collapse.”

      An average of 35,000 people cross the Simon Bolivar International Bridge linking the two countries every day. About half return to the Venezuelan side after making purchases, conducting business or visiting family. But the rest stay in Cucuta at least temporarily or move on to the Colombian interior or other countries.

      For many Venezuelans, the first stop after crossing is the Divine Providence Cafeteria, an open-air soup kitchen a stone’s throw from the bridge. A Roman Catholic priest, Father Leonardo Mendoza, and volunteer staff serve some 1,500 meals daily. But it’s not enough.

      One recent day, lines stretched halfway around the block with Venezuelans, desperation and hunger etched on their faces. But some didn’t have the tickets that were handed out earlier in the day and were turned away.

      “Children come up to me and say, ’Father, I’m hungry.’ It’s heartbreaking. It’s the children’s testimony that inspires the charitable actions of all of us here,” Mendoza said.

      The precise number of Venezuelan migrants who are staying in Colombia is difficult to calculate because of the porousness of the 1,400-mile border, which has seven formal crossings. But estimates range as high as 800,000 arrivals over the last two years. At least 500,000 have gone on to the U.S., Spain, Brazil and other Latin American countries, officials here say.

      “Every day 40 buses each filled with 40 or more Venezuelans leave Cucuta, cross Colombia and go directly to Ecuador,” said Huber Plaza, a local delegate of the National Disasters Risk Management Agency. “They stay there or go on to Chile, Argentina or Peru, which seems to be the preferred destination these days.”

      Many arrive broke, hungry and in need of immediate medical attention. Over the last two years, North Santander province, where Cucuta is located, has vaccinated 58,000 Venezuelans for measles, diphtheria and other infectious diseases because only half of the arriving children have had the shots, said Nohora Barreto, a nurse with the provincial health department.

      On the day Andrade, the retired army sergeant, sought treatment, gurneys left little space in the crowded ward and hospital corridors, creating an obstacle course for nurses and doctors who shouted orders, handed out forms and began examinations.

      Andrade and many other patients stood amid the gurneys because all the chairs and beds were taken. Nearby, a pregnant woman in the early stages of labor groaned as she walked haltingly among the urgent care patients, supported by a male companion.

      Dionisio Sanchez, a 20-year-old Venezuelan laborer, sat on a gurney awaiting treatment for a severe cut he suffered on his hand at a Cucuta construction site. Amid the bustle, shouting and medical staff squeezing by, he stared ahead quietly, holding his hand wrapped in gauze and resigned to a long wait.

      “I’m lucky this didn’t happen to me back home,” Sanchez said. “Everyone is suffering a lot there. I didn’t want to leave, but hunger and other circumstances forced me to make the decision.”

      Signs of stress caused by the flood of migrants are abundant elsewhere in this city of 650,000. Schools are overcrowded, charitable organizations running kitchens and shelters are overwhelmed and police who chase vagrants and illegal street vendors from public spaces are outmanned.

      “We’ll clear 30 people from the park, but as soon as we leave, 60 more come to replace them,” said a helmeted policeman on night patrol with four comrades at downtown’s Santander Plaza. He expressed sympathy for the migrants and shook his head as he described the multitudes of homeless, saying it was impossible to control the tide.

      Sitting on a park bench nearby was Jesus Mora, a 21-year-old mechanic who arrived from Venezuela in March. He avoids sleeping in the park, he said, and looks for an alleyway or “someplace in the shadows where police won’t bother me.”

      “As long as they don’t think I’m selling drugs, I’m OK,” Mora said. “Tonight, I’m here to wait for a truck that brings around free food at this hour.” Mora said he is hoping to get a work permit. Meanwhile, he is hustling as best he can, recycling bottles, plastic and cardboard he scavenges on the street and in trash cans.

      Metropolitan Cucuta’s school system is bursting at the seams with migrant kids, who are given six-month renewable passes to attend school. Eduardo Berbesi, principal of the 1,400-student Frontera Educational Institute, a public K-12 school in Villa de Rosario that’s located a short distance from the Simon Bolivar International Bridge, says he has funds to give lunches to only 60% of his students. He blames the government for not coming through with money to finance the school’s 40% growth in enrollment since the crisis began in 2015.

      “The government tells us to receive the Venezuelan students but gives us nothing to pay for them,” Berbesi said.

      Having to refuse lunches to hungry students bothers him. “And it’s me the kids and their parents blame, not the state.”


      #Cucuta

      On a recent afternoon, every street corner in Cucuta seemed occupied with vendors selling bananas, candy, coffee, even rolls of aluminum foil.

      “If I sell 40 little cups of coffee, I earn enough to buy a kilo of rice and a little meat,” said Jesus Torres, 35, a Venezuelan who arrived last month. He was toting a shoulder bag of thermoses he had filled with coffee that morning to sell in plastic cups. “The situation is complicated here but still better than in Venezuela.”

      That evening, Leonardo Albornoz, 33, begged for coins at downtown stoplight as his wife and three children, ages 6 months to 8 years, looked on. He said he had been out of work in his native Merida for months but decided to leave for Colombia in April because his kids “were going to sleep hungry every night.”

      When the light turned red, Albornoz approached cars and buses stopped at the intersection to offer lollipops in exchange for handouts. About half of the drivers responded with a smile and some change. Several bus passengers passed him coins through open windows.

      From the sidewalk, his 8-year-old son, Kleiver, watched despondently. It was 9:30 pm — he had school the next morning and should have been sleeping, but Albornoz and his wife said they had no one to watch him or their other kids at the abandoned building where they were staying.

      “My story is a sad one like many others, but the drop that made my glass overflow was when the [Venezuelan] government confiscated my little plot of land where we could grow things,” Albornoz said.

      The increase in informal Venezuelan workers has pushed Cucuta’s unemployment rate to 16% compared with the 9% rate nationwide, Mayor Cesar Rojas said in an interview at City Hall. Although Colombians generally have welcomed their neighbors, he said, signs of resentment among jobless local residents is growing.

      “The national government isn’t sending us the resources to settle the debts, and now we have this economic crisis,” Rojas said. “With the situation in Venezuela worsening, the exodus can only increase.”

      The Colombian government admits it has been caught off guard by the dimensions — and costs — of the Venezuelan exodus, one of the largest of its kind in recent history, said Felipe Muñoz, who was named Venezuelan border manager by President Juan Manuel Santos in February.

      “This is a critical, complex and massive problem,” Muñoz said. “No country could have been prepared to receive the volume of migrants that we are receiving. In Latin America, it’s unheard of. We’re dealing with 10 times more people than those who left the Middle East for Europe last year.”

      In agreement is Jozef Merkx, Colombia representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, which is taking an active role in helping Colombia deal with the influx. Central America saw large migrant flows in the 1980s, but they were caused by armed conflicts, he said.

      “Venezuelans are leaving for different reasons, and the mixed nature of the displaced crisis is what makes it a unique exodus,” Merkx said during an interview in his Bogota office.

      Muñoz said Colombia feels a special obligation to help Venezuelans in need. In past decades, when the neighboring country’s oil-fueled economy needed more manpower than the local population could provide, hundreds of thousands of Colombians flooded in to work. Now the tables are turned.

      Colombia’s president has appealed to the international community for help. The U.S. government recently stepped up: The State Department announced Tuesday it was contributing $18.5 million “to support displaced Venezuelans in Colombia who have fled the crisis in their country.”

      Manuel Antolinez, director of the International Committee of the Red Cross’ 240-bed shelter for Venezuelans near the border in Villa de Rosario, said he expects the crisis to get worse before easing.

      “Our reading is that after the May 20 presidential election in Venezuela and the probable victory of President [Nicolas] Maduro, there will be increased dissatisfaction with the regime and more oppression against the opposition,” he said. “Living conditions will worsen.”

      Whatever its duration, the crisis is leading Ramirez, director of the Erasmo Meoz University Hospital, to stretch out payments to his suppliers from an average of 30 days to 90 days after billing. He hopes the government will come through with financial aid.

      “The collapse will happen when we can’t pay our employees,” he said. He fears that could happen soon.

      http://www.latimes.com/world/la-fg-venezuela-colombia-20180513-story.html

    • The Venezuelan Refugee Crisis : The View from Brazil

      Shadowing the Maduro regime’s widely condemned May 20 presidential election, Venezuela’s man-made humanitarian crisis continues to metastasize, forcing hundreds of thousands of families to flee to neighboring countries. While Colombia is bearing the brunt of the mass exodus of Venezuelans, Brazil is also facing an unprecedented influx. More than 40,000 refugees, including indigenous peoples, have crossed the border into Brazil since early 2017. The majority of these refugees have crossed into and remain in Roraima, Brazil’s poorest and most isolated state. While the Brazilian government is doing what it can to address the influx of refugees and mitigate the humanitarian risks for both the Venezuelans and local residents, much more needs to be done.


      As part of its continuing focus on the Venezuelan crisis, CSIS sent two researchers on a week-long visit to Brasilia and Roraima in early May. The team met with Brazilian federal government officials, international organizations, and civil society, in addition to assessing the situation on-the-ground at the Venezuela-Brazil border.

      https://www.csis.org/analysis/venezuelan-refugee-crisis-view-brazil
      #Boa_Vista #camps_de_réfugiés

    • Le Brésil mobilise son #armée à la frontière du Venezuela

      Le président brésilien Michel Temer a ordonné mardi soir par décret l’utilisation des forces armées pour « garantir la sécurité » dans l’Etat septentrional de Roraima, à la frontière avec le Venezuela.

      Depuis des mois, des milliers de réfugiés ont afflué dans cet Etat. « Je décrète l’envoi des forces armées pour garantir la loi et l’ordre dans l’Etat de Roraima du 29 août au 12 septembre », a annoncé le chef de l’Etat.

      Le but de la mesure est de « garantir la sécurité des citoyens mais aussi des immigrants vénézuéliens qui fuient leur pays ».
      Afflux trop important

      Plusieurs dizaines de milliers d’entre eux fuyant les troubles économiques et politiques de leur pays ont afflué ces dernières années dans l’Etat de Roraima, où les services sociaux sont submergés.

      Michel Temer a ajouté que la situation était « tragique ». Et le président brésilien de blâmer son homologue vénézuélien Nicolas Maduro : « La situation au Venezuela n’est plus un problème politique interne. C’est une menace pour l’harmonie de tout le continent », a déclaré le chef d’Etat dans un discours télévisé.

      https://www.rts.ch/info/monde/9806458-le-bresil-mobilise-son-armee-a-la-frontiere-du-venezuela.html

      #frontières #militarisation_des_frontières

    • The Exiles. A Trip to the Border Highlights Venezuela’s Devastating Humanitarian Crisis

      Never have I seen this more clearly than when I witnessed first-hand Venezuelans fleeing the devastating human rights, humanitarian, political, and economic crisis their government has created.

      Last July, I stood on the Simon Bolivar bridge that connects Cúcuta in Colombia with Táchira state in Venezuela and watched hundreds of people walk by in both directions all day long, under the blazing sun. A suitcase or two, the clothes on their back — other than that, many of those pouring over the border had nothing but memories of a life left behind.

      https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2018/11/14/exiles-trip-border-highlights-venezuelas-devastating

    • Crises Colliding: The Mass Influx of Venezuelans into the Dangerous Fragility of Post-Peace Agreement Colombia

      Living under the government of President Nicolás Maduro, Venezuelans face political repression, extreme shortages of food and medicine, lack of social services, and economic collapse. Three million of them – or about 10 percent of the population – have fled the country.[1] The vast majority have sought refuge in the Americas, where host states are struggling with the unprecedented influx.
      Various actors have sought to respond to this rapidly emerging crisis. The UN set up the Regional Inter-Agency Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela, introducing a new model for agency coordination across the region. This Regional Platform, co-led by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), has established a network of subsidiary National Platforms in the major host countries to coordinate the response on the ground. At the regional level, the Organization of American States (OAS) established a Working Group to Address the Regional Crisis of Venezuelan Migrants and Refugees. Latin American states have come together through the Quito Process – a series of diplomatic meetings designed to help coordinate the response of countries in the region to the crisis. Donors, including the United States, have provided bilateral assistance.


      https://www.refugeesinternational.org/reports/2019/1/10/crises-colliding-the-mass-influx-of-venezuelans-into-the-dang

      #rapport

  • Israel averts one crisis with end of Palestinian prisoners’ hunger strike. Now Gaza looms large

    Strike leader Marwan Barghouti can chalk up achievement of putting prisoners’ plight back in Palestinian public consciousness

    Amos Harel May 28, 2017
    read more: http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.792263

    The announcement heralding the end of the Palestinian prisoners’ hunger strike on Friday night was met with a sigh of relief by Israel’s defense establishment.
    >> Get all updates on Israel and the Palestinians: Download our free App, and Subscribe >>
    The strike’s end, on the eve of Ramadan, removed a huge risk that had been lingering for the past six weeks: the potential for deterioration following the death of one of the prisoners, or an Israeli attempt to force-feed the strikers, both of which would have agitated Palestinians across the territories.
    The gap in the conflicting commentaries from both sides regarding the details of the agreement and the question of who won are inevitable, given the circumstances. Israel doesn’t want to admit it negotiated with the strike leaders – and certainly not that it made any concessions while members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet were competing with each other in their forceful declarations against the prisoners.
    The Palestinians, meanwhile, have to present any Israeli concessions, no matter how trivial, as an achievement – otherwise questions will be raised about why the lives of prisoners were put at risk and whether the demands met actually justified everything the prisoners sacrificed.

    Despite Israel’s denials, it’s clear that talks were held with the strike leaders, at least indirectly. Two weeks ago, Palestinian sources reported meetings between senior officials in the Palestinian Authority’s security apparatus and Israel’s Shin Bet security service, with the aim of ending the strike.

    The details of any arrangement that would induce the prisoners to call off their strike were crystal clear: The key issue for them was the restoration of family visits to the previous number – twice a month. The Red Cross had halved this a year ago. An agreement on this matter was reached on Friday.
    The other demands were extras. The strike leaders knew that given the current public mood in Israel, the cabinet or prison authorities would not allow the resumption of academic studies – certainly not as long as the bodies of two Israeli soldiers are being held in Gaza and two Israeli citizens are missing there.
    An improvement in specific prison conditions – an issue that isn’t a focus of media attention – can be agreed upon later. Israel ensured this would happen at a later date and wouldn’t be seen as a direct achievement of the hunger strike.
    The strike’s leaders were already handicapped by the limited response of Fatah members to join the strike. Jailed Hamas leaders didn’t take a stand, either, failing to instruct most Hamas members to join in. Outside the prison walls, senior PA officials tried to undermine the strike, fearing it would strengthen the status of senior Fatah prisoner (and strike leader) Marwan Barghouti.
    The latter can chalk up an achievement from the strike, though: it brought the prisoners’ plight to the forefront of the Palestinian agenda, and he is once more being seriously mentioned as a possible successor to President Mahmoud Abbas.
    In Israel, the sting operation in which the Israel Prison Service planted snacks in Barghouti’s cell, and recorded him eating them, served as a rich source of satire. On the Palestinian side, though, it only strengthened his image as a leader who is feared by Israel – which resorts to ugly tricks in order to trip him up. However, Barghouti still faces an internal challenge from fellow Fatah leaders, who were likely unimpressed by the fact he fell into this trap twice.
    The strike’s end resolves one Israeli headache, but two others remain in the Palestinian arena: that the religious fervor associated with Ramadan will find an outlet in the form of “lone-wolf” stabbing or car-ramming attacks, as it did last year; and the deteriorating conditions in the Gaza Strip.
    In the monthly report submitted to the UN Security Council on Friday by Nickolay Mladenov, the UN secretary-general’s special envoy to the Middle East wrote: “In Gaza we are walking into another crisis with our eyes wide open.”
    Mladenov warned the Security Council that if urgent steps are not taken to de-escalate matters, “the crisis risks spiraling out of control with devastating consequences for Palestinians and Israelis alike.”
    Mladenov reminded the Security Council that the source of the deterioration, with a reduced power supply and cuts to PA employees’ salaries in the Strip, is the political conflict between the Fatah-run PA and Hamas. Most residents in Gaza now receive electricity for only four hours a day, and this might be reduced to two hours, with the humanitarian crisis worsening. No one is interested in a military confrontation, Mladenov told Security Council members, adding that the PA, Hamas and Israel all share responsibility to prevent one.

    #Gaza #Palestine #Israël

  • Palestinian prisoners’ hunger strike in Israeli jails ends - Palestinians - Haaretz
    http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/.premium-1.792174

    The hunger strike of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails ended after 40 days on Friday night, according to the Israel Prison Service and Palestinian officials.
    The hunger strike ended after Israel reached an agreement with the Palestinian Authority and the Red Cross over prisoners’ visitation rights, according to the prison service. The sides agreed that the prisoners would be eligible for two visits a month, as was in the past before being reduced to one visit a month.
    The strike ended in time for the month-long Muslim fast of Ramadan, which begins on Saturday.
    Despite Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan’s remarks according to which there will be no negotiations and that the prisoners’ demands won’t be met, the strike ended following days of talks that peaked on Friday night. This, while the prison service attempted to reach some understandings over the strike prior to U.S. President Donald Trump’s arrival in Israel earlier this week. The prison service stressed that there were no negotiations with the prisoners, but rather that “understandings” had been reached.

    #Palestine #grèvedelafaim #Israël

  • Microsoft’s Brad Smith : We Need a « Digital Geneva Convention » | Data Center Knowledge
    http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2017/02/14/microsofts-brad-smith-need-digital-geneva-convention

    The present and future of warfare takes place on computer terminals, innocent civilians worldwide are not being protected by their government, and it’s time for the tech industry to pull together and call on the world’s governments to come together in a Digital Geneva Convention. So said Brad Smith, president and chief legal officer at Microsoft, in an RSA 2017 keynote on Tuesday morning.

    And so, Smith said, “When it comes to attacks, [the tech industry] is not only the plain of battle, we are the world’s first responders.”

    As such, the tech industry should come together and call on the world’s governments to conduct a digital Geneva Convention to devise and agree to rules protecting civilian use of the Internet.

    Après cela, Brad Smith pousse le bouton (et la comparaiso) un peu loin :

    Just as the Fourth Geneva Convention has long protected civilians in times of war, we now need a Digital Geneva Convention that will commit governments to protecting civilians from nation-state attacks in times of peace. And just as the Fourth Geneva Convention recognized that the protection of civilians required the active involvement of the Red Cross, protection against nation-state cyberattacks requires the active assistance of technology companies. The tech sector plays a unique role as the internet’s first responders, and we therefore should commit ourselves to collective action that will make the internet a safer place, affirming a role as a neutral Digital Switzerland that assists customers everywhere and retains the world’s trust.

    On retrouve encore et toujours cet « esprit d’Asilomar » qui veut que l’auto-régulation des secteurs industriels échappent aux services collectifs et reviennent aux acteurs du secteur eux-mêmes (avec l’aide, l’appui et la bénédiction des pouvoirs publics qui se trouvent libérés d’un fardeau éthique et politique.

  • Britain’s health service in a ’humanitarian crisis’: Red Cross
    https://www.yahoo.com/news/britains-health-humanitarian-crisis-red-cross-100221224.html

    Britain’s health service is engulfed in a “humanitarian crisis” that requires the support of the Red Cross to use Land Rovers to transport patients, the charity said on Saturday.

    Founded in 1948, the National Health Service (NHS) is a source of huge pride for many Britons who are able to access free care from the cradle to the grave.

    But tight budgets, an ageing population and increasingly complex medical needs have left many hospitals struggling during the winter season in recent years, prompting headlines about patients being left to wait on trolleys for hours or even days.

    The NHS rejected the Red Cross’ description and the Department of Health said it had injected an additional 400 million pounds ($490 million) to help with the demand, but the opposition Labour Party called on Prime Minister Theresa May to do more to tackle the overcrowding.
    […]
    The row was triggered by a statement on the British Red Cross website, next to appeals for help in Yemen and Syria, which said it was now “on the front line, responding to the humanitarian crisis in our hospital and ambulance services across the country”.

    • NHS rejects claims of ’humanitarian crisis’ in England’s hospitals - BBC News
      http://www.bbc.com/news/health-38538637

      One of NHS England’s specialist directors said he thought the service was not “at that point” of crisis, but admitted demand was higher than ever.
      […]
      Figures show that 42 A&E departments ordered ambulances to divert to other hospitals last week - double the number during the same period in 2015.

      Diversions can only happen when a department is under significant pressure, such as lacking the capacity to take more patients or having queues of ambulances outside for significantly prolonged periods, and when all existing plans to deal with a surge in patients have been unsuccessful.

      The Royal College of Emergency Medicine said staff were under intense pressure, while the Society for Acute Medicine warned this month could be the worst January the NHS had ever faced.

      Its president, Dr Mark Holland, told BBC Breakfast that the term “humanitarian crisis” was strong, but “not a million miles away from the truth”.

  • Refugees and vulnerable migrants in Europe

    This edition of Humanitarian Exchange is dedicated to the humanitarian response to the influx of refugees and vulnerable migrants into Europe over the past year.

    One of the most notable features of the European response, as Pamela DeLargy notes in her lead article, is the central role volunteers have played – in stark contrast to the much slower response of international agencies and donors.
    Laetitia de Radigues and Ludovico Gammarelli give an overview of the European Commission’s response.
    Key findings of research led by Coventry University on the complex picture of migration into Greece are summarised by Heaven Crawley.
    Jessica Hagen-Zanker and Richard Mallett highlight the limitations of deterrence policies in determining people’s migration choices.
    Amelia Stoenescu and colleagues report on International Organisation for Migration (IOM) data and information-sharing systems to track movements in the Western Balkans.
    Gareth Walker discusses the challenges of addressing the health needs of mobile populations.
    Returning to the issue of volunteerism, John Borton reflects on the potential implications for humanitarian action.
    Emma Eggink and Melinda McRostie give a first-hand account of the evolution of the Starfish Foundation, a grassroots volunteer initiative on Lesvos.
    The contribution of Hellenic Red Cross volunteers is highlighted by Kate Latimir.
    Rachel Erskine and Katie Robertson outline RedR’s training programme for volunteers.
    In a pair of articles, Elodie Francart, Michaël Neuman and Angélique Muller reflect on Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)’s experience in Brussels and northern France in engaging with NGOs, volunteer groups, municipal officials and political activists.
    Alexandre Le Clève, Evangeline Masson-Diez and Olivier Peyroux underline the predicament of unaccompanied children in camps in northern France and along the Channel coast.
    Minh Tram Le and colleagues highlight the importance of infant and young child feeding for refugees stranded in Greece.
    The edition ends with articles by Emily Whitehead and Theo Hannides and colleagues reflecting on the findings from an independent evaluation of the Start Network’s collaborative response and the findings of Start-funded research on the information and communication needs of refugees in Greece and Germany.

    http://odihpn.org/magazine/refugees-vulnerable-migrants-europe
    #asile #migrations #réfugiés #personnes_vulnérables #vulnérabilité

  •  » The Orient Express UrbEx | Forgotten & Abandoned
    http://www.urbex.nl/site/rail-graveyard

    These trains and coaches are rusting away. They were placed at this site by the national railway company from Belgium; the plans were to safe them for a railway museum. Because the city planned a new parking lot on this site the trains have to move. But as long there is no place available for the museum the trains are getting worse and worse.

    In 2012 the Red Cross train was moved. Only the old type 620 train is left. The type 620 was once the pride of the Belgium railway, they were introduced in 1936. Today this is the only one left.

    On the internet this train went viral because a photographer called it the ‘Orient Express’, but it’s not. It was only used for national transport.

    #Belgique #chemin_de_fer #photographie