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By International Organization for Migration
BRUSSELS, Jul 3 2018 (IOM)

IOM, the UN Migration Agency, has put forward three recommendations to the incoming Austrian Presidency of the Council of the European Union that are based on our view that better migration governance – national, regional and global – benefits the entire migration spectrum: migrants, their home countries and the countries of destination, and requires political courage, evidence-based vision, and a human-centred approach.

Yesterday (02/07) IOM, the UN Migration Agency, presented its migration recommendations to Austria as it took over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union (EU) on 1 July for a six-month tenure.

IOM is drawing attention to three key areas in its recommendations paper: Africa border and identity management, the EU’s Multi-Annual Financial Framework (MFF), and the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM).

“Austria will be leading the rotating EU Presidency through a critical period in the second half of 2018 when the GCM focus shifts to implementation and the EU agrees its next multi-annual financial framework,” Eugenio Ambrosi, IOM Regional Director for the European Union, Norway and Switzerland, said in Brussels.

“Our recommendations are rooted in IOM’s conviction that better migration governance at all levels – national, regional and global – benefits not only migrants, but also their home countries and the countries of destination, and must be governed with political courage, evidence-based vision, and a human-centred approach,” added Ambrosi.

The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration is meant to address all aspects of migration and will have implications for both the internal and external policies of the EU.

The EU and its Member States should be encouraged to promote a comprehensive approach to migration that would put the rights, needs, capacities and contributions of migrants at its core, with a view to ensuring their safety, dignity and human rights in line with the GCM vision.

The intergovernmental negotiations on the GCM are scheduled to close in July 2018 and the adoption of the Compact is expected to take place at an intergovernmental conference in December 2018. In this interim period between these two milestones, IOM calls on the Austrian EU Presidency to set up a process to prepare for the implementation of the Compact.

Building on the EU’s migration policy commitments to working with partner countries, as well as on its prioritization of Africa as a key region for cooperation on issues around human mobility, IOM recommends that the Austrian Presidency work with African counterparts towards enhancing their border and identity management capacities to benefit African intraregional mobility and to contribute to safe and regular migration to the EU, the latter supported also by EU’s own visa policy reform.

Finally, integration, social cohesion, human rights, humanitarian aid and development cooperation all need sound investment, as successful migration policies are a long-term societal ambition. For these policies to be strategic, results-oriented and long-term, they need to be properly resourced. This year’s consultations for the next EU Multi-Annual Financial Framework offer a unique opportunity for the EU and its Member States to ensure sustainable and ambitious financial commitments to create a Europe that unites and upholds its international commitments.

IOM calls on the Presidency to allocate appropriate resources for a strategic, results-oriented and long-term migration policy.

“IOM stands ready to support the Presidency and EU member states through its global expertise and operational tools to advance our joint commitment to improving global migration governance and ensuring that each and every migrant is assisted, with their fundamental rights upheld,” said Ambrosi.

IOM’s twice-yearly recommendations to the rotating EU Presidencies are guided by its Migration Governance Framework (MiGOF) which is the first, and so far only global detailed articulation of planned and well-managed migration policies.

The six-month incumbent Presidents of the Council of the EU work together in groups of three in the interest of continuity and coherency. The current Presidential trio comprises Estonia (July/December 2017), Bulgaria (January/June 2018) and Austria (July/December 2018). The presidential representatives chair meetings at every level and propose the guidelines needed for the Council to take decisions.

IOM’s recommendations can be downloaded here in PDF.

For more information please contact Melissa Julian at IOM Brussels, Tel: +32 287 7133, Email: mjulian@iom.int

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OFID Director-General Suleiman J Al-Herbish (left) and Habitat for Humanity’s Area Vice President for Europe, Middle East and Africa, Torre Nelson. Image credit: Habitat for Humanity Int’l

By WAM
VIENNA, Jul 3 2018 (WAM)

The OPEC Fund for International Development, OFID, has signed a US$420,000 grant agreement with Habitat for Humanity International to support a project aimed at improving living conditions for slum dwellers on Peace Island, Greater Monrovia, Liberia.

The agreement was signed at Habitat’s regional office in Bratislava, Slovakia, by OFID Director-General Suleiman J Al-Herbish, and Habitat for Humanity’s Area Vice President for Europe, Middle East and Africa, Torre Nelson.

At the signing ceremony, Al-Herbish spoke of OFID’s strong commitment to helping boost socio-economic development in its partner countries – particularly the least developed in sub-Sahara Africa. He said OFID would continue directing a substantial portion of its resources to countries lacking adequate water and sanitation infrastructure and facing water shortages.

Nelson thanked OFID for its support, which will dramatically improve the living conditions of families, especially children, who had to walk long distances to reach a water point. He said Habitat’s partnership with OFID will enable approximately 13,000 people to gain access to clean water, adequate sanitation and hygiene.

The project communities in the district of Greater Monrovia are facing a number of challenges that include a lack of safe drinking water and sanitation services, resulting in a high incidence of waterborne diseases. This situation is exacerbated by unplanned urban growth. The OFID-supported project is part of a broader program underway to provide affordable and better-quality housing among vulnerable and low-income communities.

UN-Habitat will carry out interventions that include building/renovating potable water and sanitary facilities, hygiene and health awareness-raising and providing support to community-led waste collection and management. Also planned is an affordable housing scheme that will provide construction materials and micro-finance loans, as well as capacity building.

Liberia has been a beneficiary of regional OFID grants that have helped fund HIV/AIDS and polio eradication, fight Ebola and support water safety and clean cooking initiatives.

[Image caption: OFID Director-General Suleiman J Al-Herbish (left) and Habitat for Humanity’s Area Vice President for Europe, Middle East and Africa, Torre Nelson. Image credit: Habitat for Humanity Int’l]

WAM/Rola Alghoul/Rasha Abubaker

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DAVID E. BLOOM is the Clarence James Gamble Professor of Economics and Demography, DANIEL CADARETTE is a research assistant, and JP SEVILLA is a research associate, all at Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

By David E. Bloom, Daniel Cadarette and JP Sevilla
WASHINGTON DC, Jul 3 2018 (IPS)

Infectious diseases and associated mortality have abated, but they remain a significant threat throughout the world.

We continue to fight both old pathogens, such as the plague, that have troubled humanity for millennia and new pathogens, such as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), that have mutated or spilled over from animal reservoirs.

Some infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis and malaria, are endemic to many areas, imposing substantial but steady burdens. Others, such as influenza, fluctuate in pervasiveness and intensity, wreaking havoc in developing and developed economies alike when an outbreak (a sharp increase in prevalence in a relatively limited area or population), an epidemic (a sharp increase covering a larger area or population), or a pandemic (an epidemic covering multiple countries or continents) occurs.

The health risks of outbreaks and epidemics—and the fear and panic that accompany them—map to various economic risks.

First, and perhaps most obviously, there are the costs to the health system, both public and private, of medical treatment of the infected and of outbreak control. A sizable outbreak can overwhelm the health system, limiting the capacity to deal with routine health issues and compounding the problem.

Beyond shocks to the health sector, epidemics force both the ill and their caretakers to miss work or be less effective at their jobs, driving down and disrupting productivity.

Fear of infection can result in social distancing or closed schools, enterprises, commercial establishments, transportation, and public services—all of which disrupt economic and other socially valuable activity.

Concern over the spread of even a relatively contained outbreak can lead to decreased trade. For example, a ban imposed by the European Union on exports of British beef lasted 10 years following identification of a mad cow disease outbreak in the United Kingdom, despite relatively low transmission to humans.

Travel and tourism to regions affected by outbreaks are also likely to decline. Some long-running epidemics, such as HIV and malaria, deter foreign direct investment as well.

The economic risks of epidemics are not trivial. Victoria Fan, Dean Jamison, and Lawrence Summers recently estimated the expected yearly cost of pandemic influenza at roughly $500 billion (0.6 percent of global income), including both lost income and the intrinsic cost of elevated mortality.

Even when the health impact of an outbreak is relatively limited, its economic consequences can quickly become magnified. Liberia, for example, saw GDP growth decline 8 percentage points from 2013 to 2014 during the recent Ebola outbreak in west Africa, even as the country’s overall death rate fell over the same period.

The consequences of outbreaks and epidemics are not distributed equally throughout the economy. Some sectors may even benefit financially, while others will suffer disproportionately.

Pharmaceutical companies that produce vaccines, antibiotics, or other products needed for outbreak response are potential beneficiaries. Health and life insurance companies are likely to bear heavy costs, at least in the short term, as are livestock producers in the event of an outbreak linked to animals.

Vulnerable populations, particularly the poor, are likely to suffer disproportionately, as they may have less access to health care and lower savings to protect against financial catastrophe.

Economic policymakers are accustomed to managing various forms of risk, such as trade imbalances, exchange rate movements, and changes in market interest rates. There are also risks that are not strictly economic in origin.

Armed conflict represents one such example; natural disasters are another. We can think about the economic disruption caused by outbreaks and epidemics along these same lines. As with other forms of risk, the economic risk of health shocks can be managed with policies that reduce their likelihood and that position countries to respond swiftly when they do occur.

Several factors complicate the management of epidemic risk. Diseases can be transmitted rapidly, both within and across countries, which means that timely responses to initial outbreaks are essential. In addition to being exacerbated by globalization, epidemic potential is elevated by the twin phenomena of climate change and urbanization.

Climate change is expanding the habitats of various common disease vectors, such as the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which can spread dengue, chikungunya, Zika, and yellow fever. Urbanization means more humans live in close quarters, amplifying the transmissibility of contagious disease.

In rapidly urbanizing areas, the growth of slums forces more people to live in conditions with substandard sanitation and poor access to clean water, compounding the problem.

Perhaps the greatest challenge is the formidable array of possible causes of epidemics, including pathogens that are currently unknown. In December 2015 the World Health Organization (WHO) published a list of epidemic-potential disease priorities requiring urgent research and development (R&D) attention.

That list has since been updated twice, most recently in February 2018 (see table).

Beyond this list, diseases that are currently endemic in some areas but could spread without proper control represent another category of threat. Tuberculosis, malaria, and dengue are examples, as is HIV.

Pathogens resistant to antimicrobials are increasing in prevalence throughout the world, and widespread pan-drug-resistant superbugs could pose yet another hazard. Rapid transmission of resistant pathogens is unlikely to occur in the same way it may with pandemic threats, but the proliferation of superbugs is making the world an increasingly risky place.

Epidemic risk is complex, but policymakers have tools they can deploy in response. Some tools minimize the likelihood of outbreaks or limit their proliferation. Others attempt to minimize the health impact of outbreaks that cannot be prevented or immediately contained. Still others aim to minimize the economic impact.

Investing in improved sanitation, provisioning of clean water, and better urban infrastructure can reduce the frequency of human contact with pathogenic agents.

Building strong health systems and supporting proper nutrition will help ensure good baseline levels of health, making people less susceptible to infection. Of course, strengthening basic systems, services, and infrastructure becomes easier with economic growth and development; however, policies to protect spending in these areas even when budgets are constrained can help safeguard developing economies from major health shocks that could significantly impinge upon human capital and impede economic growth.

Investment in reliable disease surveillance in both human and animal populations is also critical. Within formal global surveillance systems, it may be beneficial to develop incentives for reporting suspected outbreaks, as countries may reasonably fear the effects of such reporting on trade, tourism, and other economic outcomes.

The SARS epidemic, for instance, might have been better contained if China had reported the initial outbreak to the WHO earlier.

Informal surveillance systems, such as ProMED and HealthMap, which aggregate information from official surveillance reports, media reports, online discussions and summaries, and eyewitness observations, can also help national health systems and international responders get ahead of the epidemiological curve during the early stages of an outbreak.

Social media offers additional opportunities for early detection of shifts in infectious disease incidence.

Collaborations for monitoring epidemic readiness at the national level, such as the Global Health Security Agenda and the Joint External Evaluation Alliance, provide information national governments can use to bolster their planned outbreak responses.

Additional research into which pathogens are likely to spread and have a big impact would be worthwhile.

Countries should be ready to take initial measures to limit the spread of disease when an outbreak does occur. Historically, ships were quarantined in port during plague epidemics to prevent the spread of the disease to coastal cities. In the case of highly virulent and highly transmissible diseases, quarantines may still be necessary, although they can inspire concerns about human rights.

Likewise, it may be necessary to ration biomedical countermeasures if supplies are limited. Countries should decide in advance if they will prioritize first responders and other key personnel or favor vulnerable groups, such as children and the elderly; different strategies may be appropriate for different diseases.

Technological solutions can help minimize the burden of sizable outbreaks and epidemics. Better and less-costly treatments—including novel antibiotics and antivirals to counter resistant diseases—are sorely needed. New and improved vaccines are perhaps even more important.

There is a significant market failure when it comes to vaccines against individual low-probability pathogens that collectively are likely to cause epidemics. Given the low probability that any single vaccine of this type will be needed, high R&D costs, and delayed returns, pharmaceutical companies hesitate to invest in their development. The profit-seeking interest does not align well with the social interest of minimizing the risk posed by these diseases in the aggregate.

Farsighted international collaboration can overcome this market failure—for example, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, which is supported by the governments of Australia, Belgium, Canada, Ethiopia, India, Japan, Germany, and Norway, as well as the European Commission and various nongovernmental funders.

Its goals include advancing candidate vaccines against specific low-probability, high-severity pathogens through proof of concept to enable rapid clinical testing and scale-up in the event of outbreaks of those pathogens.

It also aims to fund development of institutional and technical platforms to speed R&D in response to outbreaks for which there are no vaccines. Similar funding models could support the development of a universal influenza vaccine.

Of course, new vaccines will be less useful if governments do not ensure that at-risk populations have access to them. Assured access could also motivate developing economies to participate actively in the vaccine R&D process.

In 2007 Indonesia withheld samples of the H5N1 influenza virus from the WHO to protest the fact that companies in wealthy countries often use samples freely provided by developing economies to produce vaccines and other countermeasures without returning any profit or other special benefits to the donors.

Beyond funding R&D, international collaboration could boost epidemic preparedness by supporting centralized stockpiling of vaccines and drugs that can be deployed where they are most needed. Such collaboration has obvious advantages over a system in which each country stockpiles its own biomedical countermeasures.

While some countries are more likely to need these countermeasures than others, the global public good of living without fear of pandemics should motivate cooperation and cost sharing.

In addition, wealthy countries at relatively low risk of suffering massive health impacts from most epidemics could suffer disproportionately large economic losses—even from faraway epidemics—given the size of their economies and reliance on foreign trade.

If outbreaks do occur and impose a substantial health burden, there are tools to limit the risk of economic catastrophe. As with natural disasters, insurance can help distribute the economic burden across sectors of the economy and regions.

Prioritizing personnel such as health care workers, members of the military, and public safety employees for distribution of biomedical countermeasures during an outbreak can help protect critical economic resources.

We cannot predict which pathogen will spur the next major epidemic, where that epidemic will originate, or how dire the consequences will be. But as long as humans and infectious pathogens coexist, outbreaks and epidemics are certain to occur and to impose significant costs.

The upside is that we can take proactive steps to manage the risk of epidemics and mitigate their impact. Concerted action now at the local, national, and multinational levels can go a long way toward protecting our collective well-being in the future.

http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2018/06/economic-risks-and-impacts-of-epidemics/bloom.htm?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery

Opinions expressed in articles and other materials are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect IMF policy.

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Excerpt:

DAVID E. BLOOM is the Clarence James Gamble Professor of Economics and Demography, DANIEL CADARETTE is a research assistant, and JP SEVILLA is a research associate, all at Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

The post New & Resurgent Infectious Diseases Can Have Far-reaching Economic Repercussions appeared first on Inter Press Service.

South Sudanese Christians celebrate Christmas mass at El Fasher church in North Darfur. South Sudan's different churches have remained one of the country's few stable institutions. Credit: UN Photo/Olivier Chassot

By James Jeffrey
JUBA, Jul 3 2018 (IPS)

Throughout fifty years of struggles, South Sudan’s different churches have remained one of the country’s few stable institutions, and in their workings toward peace, have displayed a level of inter-religious cooperation rarely seen in the world. 

Priests and pastors from numerous denominations brought humanitarian relief to civilians during South Sudan’s long wars for independence — often considered a fight for religious freedom for the mostly Christian south — from the hard-line Islamist government to the north in Khartoum, Sudan.

Amid destruction and failed politics, church leaders emerged as the only players left standing with any credibility and national recognition, enabling them to effectively lobby the international community to support the southern cause while also brokering peace between communities torn apart by war and ethnic strife.

However, they have been less able to influence politicians and generals in South Sudan’s latest civil war raging since 2013, which began just two years after gaining independence from Sudan. Last week, South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir and rebels, led by his former vice president Riek Machar, signed a peace agreement to bring about a ceasefire. But Reuters reported that fighting broke out again on Sunday, killing 18 civilians. “The blood of the tribe has become thicker than the blood of the Christ," Episcopal Bishop Enock Tombe.

“The new outbreak of war caught the Church unprepared,” says John Ashworth, referring to the five-year civil war. Ashworth has worked in South Sudan, including advising its churches, for more than 30 years. “While the Church played a major role in protecting people and mobilising humanitarian support, and in mediating local peace and reconciliation processes, it took quite a while to rebuild the capacity to implement national level initiatives.”

Although Islam has dominated the region for centuries, Christian roots in Sudan and South Sudan go back to the 5th century. Missionaries were active in the 1800s, mainly from the Anglican, Presbyterian, Catholic and Coptic churches.

Though there are conflicting reports about South Sudan’s exact religious composition, Christianity is the dominant religion, with a 2012 Pew Research Centre report estimating that around 60 percent are Christian, 33 percent followers of African traditional religions, six percent Muslim and the rest unaffiliated.

In the face of shared adversity, South Sudan’s Christian churches embraced an ecumenical approach to establish the South Sudan Council of Churches (SSCC), which spearheaded the churches’ joint efforts that proved heavily influential in the 2005 peace deal that ended Africa’s longest-running civil war.

The SSCC continued its involvement in the process that led to the January 2011 referendum on independence, in which an overwhelming majority of South Sudanese voted to secede and become Africa’s first new country since Eritrea split from Ethiopia in 1993. South Sudan formally gained independence from Sudan on Jul. 9, 2011.

But all those achievements began to unravel in 2013 when government troops began massacring ethnic Nuer in the capital, Juba. Afterwards, the national army, called the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), split along ethnic lines during a violent uprising, pitting ethnic Dinka loyal to Kiir against Nuer led by Macher.

Both sides committed atrocities, while the narrative of fighting for religious freedom was manipulated for political advantage. The SPLA has painted themselves as Christian liberators — atrocities notwithstanding — their propaganda referring to the churchgoing Kiir as the “Joshua” who took South Sudan to the promised land of independence.

“The blood of the tribe has become thicker than the blood of the Christ,” Episcopal Bishop Enock Tombe remarked in 2014.

But the church has been caught up in the divisive fallout too. 

“The current war has divided people along ethnic lines — the church is not immune to these divisions,” says Carol Berger, an anthropologist who specialises in South Sudan.

In a speech in April, South Sudan’s vice president James Wani Igga accused priests of promoting violence.

“While individual clergy may have their own political sympathies, and while pastors on the ground continue to empathise with their local flock, the churches as bodies have remained united in calling for an end to the killing, a peaceful resolution through dialogue, peace and reconciliation — in some cases at great personal risk,” Ashworth says.

Some have accused the church of inaction during the latest civil war. Ashworth suggests that after the 2005 peace agreement the SSCC “took a breather to rebuild and repair,” with the 2013 outbreak of war catching them unprepared and less capable. Subsequently it has taken church leaders longer than expected to rebuild capacity, but now the SSCC is taking action to make up for lost ground.

It has begun by choosing a new Secretary General, says Philip Winter, a South Sudan specialist who has long been engaged in its peace processes. He notes how the SSCC was called upon by the warring parties negotiating in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, to help them get over their differences — something the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) failed to do as a mediator.

Following the talks in Ethiopia in June, both warring sides signed a peace agreement in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital, a week later.

“The SSCC recognised that is was perhaps not as effective as the most recent conflict required,” Winter says. “So they are once more playing an important, if discreet, role.” 

The SSCC’s renewed impetus includes implementing a national Action Plan for Peace (APP), which recognises the need for a long-term peace process to resolve not only the current conflict but also the unresolved effects of previous conflicts which are contributing causes of the current conflict. The SSCC says the APP may continue for 10 or 20 years.

At this stage of the plan, the SSCC hopes to see a visit to the country by Pope Francis, the head of the Catholic Church. Earlier this year a delegation of Christian leaders from South Sudan met the Pope and urged him to visit.

“We gave the situation of the Church in South Sudan, that the people are hungry for peace, and they expect the Pope to visit them,” the Bishop Emeritus of Tori, Paride Taban, a member of the delegation, told media after meeting the Pope. “He [the Pope] encourages us not to fear. We are not alone, he is with us, and he will surely come.”

The bishop spoke at the Rome headquarters of Sant’Egidio, a peace and humanitarian group that is trying to help peace efforts in South Sudan. The group played a crucial role in the 2015 papal visit to another war-torn country, the Central African Republic, and was instrumental in the signing of the Mozambique peace accords in 1992. 

The Pope previously postponed a planned 2017 South Sudan trip with Justin Welby, the head of the Anglican Church. Most media assumed that decision was based on the country being too dangerous to visit. But Welby told media the visit was postponed to ensure it would have the maximum impact in helping to establish peace. However, with the current, tentative ceasefire, the pope may visit to consolidate peace.

“You’re playing a heavyweight card and you have to get the timing right,” he said. “You don’t waste a card like that on anything that is not going to work.”

Others, however, remain deeply sceptical of how the Pope could visit.

“I see no way that the Pope could visit South Sudan,” says Berger. “The capital of Juba is a sad and troubled place these days. People have left for their villages, or neighbouring countries. Shops and hotels have closed. The town is heavily militarised and there is hunger everywhere.”

Whether the Pope would have a lasting impact, if he comes, remains to be seen. But current events indicate why the SSCC think it worth his trying, as the world’s youngest state remains afflicted by war and famine, and mired in an almost constant state of humanitarian crisis.     

“More exhortations to the antagonists to stop fighting are largely a waste of breath,” Winter says.

Related Articles

• In South Sudan, Denial of Humanitarian Aid is a War Tactic
• UN Refugee Agency Calls for Aid and Peace in South Sudan
• As Peace Talks Resume, South Sudan Continues Assault on Press Freedom
• Need for Inclusive Peace Efforts in South Sudan: No More ‘Compassion Fatigue’

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Katy Rodríguez and her son (in his father’s arms) when they were reunited after leaving the Migrant Assistance Centre in San Salvador following their deportation. Like thousands of other Central American families since April, mother and son were separated for four months after entering the United States without the proper documents. Credit: Edgardo Ayala/IPS

By Edgardo Ayala
SAN SALVADOR, Jul 2 2018 (IPS)

After three hours of paperwork, Katy Rodriguez from El Salvador, who was deported from the United States, finally exited the government’s immigration facilities together with her young son and embraced family members who were waiting outside.

Rodríguez and her three-year-old son were reunited again on Jun. 28, just before she was sent back to her home country El Salvador. She is originally from Chalatenanango, in the central department of the same name.

The 29-year-old mother and her little boy spent more than four months apart after being detained on Feb. 19 for being intercepted without the proper documents in the U.S. state of Texas, where they entered the country from the Mexican border city of Reynosa.

“It’s been bad, very bad, everything we’ve been through, my son in one place and me in another,” Rodríguez told IPS in a brief statement before getting into a family car outside the Migrant Assistance Centre, where Salvadorans deported from both the United States and Mexico arrive.

She was informed she could apply for asylum, but that meant spending more time away from her son, and for that reason she chose to be deported. “I felt immense joy when they finally gave me my child,” she said with a faint smile..

Rodriguez was held in a detention centre on the outskirts of San Antonio, Texas, while her son was sent to a children’s shelter in far-flung New York City as a result of the “Zero Tolerance” policy on illegal immigration imposed in April by the Donald Trump administration.

The traumatic events experienced by Rodríguez and her son are similar to what has happened to thousands of families, most of them from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, detained and separated on the southern U.S. border after Trump implemented the measure to, in theory, stem the flow of immigrants to the United States.

According to the Salvadoran General Migration Officete, between Jan. 1 and Jun. 27, 39 minors were deported from the US, either alone or accompanied, 1,020 from Mexico and five others from other locations. That figure of 1,064 is well below the 1,472 returned in the first half of 2017.

Of the 2,500 children separated from their parents or guardians on the southern border of the U.S. since April, just over 2,000 are still being held in detention centres and shelters in that country, according to the media and human rights organisations.

This is despite the fact that President Trump signed a decree on Jun. 20 putting an end to the separation of families.

Images of children locked up in cages created by metal fencing, crying and asking to see their parents, triggered an international outcry.

“The detention of children and the separation of families is comparable to the practice of torture under international law and U.S. law itself. There is an intention to inflict harm by the authorities for the purpose of coercion,” Erika Guevara, Amnesty International’s director for the Americas, told IPS from Mexico City.

The plane in which Rodríguez was deported carried another 132 migrants, including some 20 women, who told IPS about the abuses and human rights violations suffered in the detention centres.

The presidents of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras and the vice president of the United States gave a press conference after a Jun. 28 meeting in Guatemala City on the issue of migration by undocumented Central Americans to the U.S.. Credit: Presidency of El Salvador

Carolina Díaz, 21, who worked in a maquiladora – export assembly plant – before migrating to the United States, told IPS that she was held for a day and a half in what migrants refer to as the “icebox” in McAllen,Texas.

The icebox is kept extremely cold on purpose, because the guards turn up the air conditioning as a form of punishment “for crossing the border without papers,” said Díaz, a native of Ciudad Arce, in the central department of La Libertad, El Salvador.

“You practically freeze to death there, with nothing to keep yourself warm with,” she added, saying she had decided to migrate “because of the economic situation, looking for a better future.”

To sleep, all they gave her was a thermal blanket that looked like a giant sheet of aluminum foil, she said. Another woman, who did not want to be identified, told IPS that she was held in the icebox for nine days without knowing exactly why.

Díaz also spent another day and a half in the “kennel,” as they refer to the metal cages where dozens of undocumented immigrants are held.

“When I was in the kennel, the guards made fun of us, they threw the food at us as if we were dogs, almost always stale bologna sandwiches,” she said.

Díaz said that in McAllen, as well as in a similar detention centre in Laredo, Texas, she saw many mothers who had been separated from their children, crying inconsolably.

“The mothers were traumatised by the pain of the separation,” she said.

Guevara of Amnesty International said Trump’s decree does not stop the separations, but only postpones them, and families will continue to be detained, including those seeking asylum.

“The president’s Jun. 20 decree does not say what they are going to do with the more than 2,000 children already separated, in a situation of disorder that is generating other human rights violations,” she said.

These violations include the failure to notify parents or guardians when children are transferred to other detention facilities.

She added that the United States has created the world’s largest immigrant detention system, and currently operates 115 centres with at least 300,000 people detained each year.

Meanwhile, Marleny Montenegro, a psychologist with the Migrations programme in Guatemala’s non-governmental Psychosocial Action and StudiesTeam, explained that children detained and separated from their parents suffer from depression, fear, anxiety and anguish, among other psychological issues.

“They are affected in their ability to trust, their insecurity and they have trouble reintegrating into the community and in communicating their feelings and thoughts,” Montenegro told IPS from the Guatemalan capital.

The plane with undocumented deportees arrived in El Salvador on the same day as U.S. Vice President Michael Pence, who was meeting in Guatemala with Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales, Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, and El Salvador’s President Sánchez Cerén.

Pence’s aim at the Jun. 28 meeting was to obtain a commitment from the three governments to adopt policies to curb migration to the U.S. According the figures he cited, 150,000 Central Americans have arrived to the US. so far this year – an irregular migration flow that he said “must stop.”

In a joint statement, at the end of what they called “a frank dialogue” with Pence, the three Central American leaders expressed their willingness to work together with the United States on actions that prioritise the well-being of children and adolescents, family unity and the due process of law.

They also stressed the importance of working in a coordinated manner to inform nationals of their countries of the risks involved in irregular migration and to combat human trafficking and smuggling networks.

Related Articles

• Deported Salvadorans in Times of Trump

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Secretary-General António Guterres - UN Photo/Mark Garten

By Kelsey Davenport
WASHINGTON DC, Jul 2 2018 (IPS)

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the nuclear deal with Iran is at a “crossroads” and expressed his deep regret over U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the agreement and reimpose sanctions.

Guterres also called upon all states to support the nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), saying “it is important that the withdrawal of one country not impede the ability of others to fully implement their commitments under the [JCPOA] or to engage in activities consistent with resolution 2231.”

Guterres’s remarks were part of a biannual report to the Security Council that assessed the implementation of Resolution 2231, which endorsed the JCPOA and called upon all states to support it.

The resolution also put in place legally binding requirements for states to seek Security Council approval before transferring dual-use nuclear materials and technologies, ballistic missiles components, and arms. (See below for more details.)

The United States, however, is making it difficult for states to continue supporting the deal by conducting legitimate business with Iran. U.S. officials are traveling to capitals and urging states to abide by the sanctions Trump re-imposed May 8. The penalties for these sanctions will be enforced Aug. 6 and Nov. 4 after 90- and 180-day wind-down periods.

A senior State Department official told press June 26 that the United States is pushing for all allies to cut oil imports from Iran to zero by Nov. 4 and that the “predisposition” is not to grant any waivers.

The fiscal year 2012 National Defense Authorization Act only requires states to make a “significant reduction” for an exemption from sanctions but does not specify the amount of the reduction. It is unclear if the administration is actually interpreting that to mean “zero.” It is also not clear if the oil market could absorb zeroing out exports from Iran.

Chris Ford, assistant secretary of state for international security and nonproliferation, said on June 11 that the United States is prepared to “lean hard on our partners and the international community” as Washington pursues its strategy of using sanctions to pressure Iran into new negotiations on its ballistic missiles and regional activities, as well as its nuclear program.

Iran continues to maintain that it will pull out of the JCPOA if the sanctions relief envisioned by the deal dries up. Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said June 22 in Moscow that “Iran’s exit from the nuclear deal is probable in the coming weeks” but noted that Tehran is still waiting to evaluate Europe’s response to the U.S. violation of the deal and reimposition of sanctions.

The EU has already adopted some measures, including an update to its blocking regulation that prohibits European entities from cooperation with U.S. sanctions, and is considering others.

He called June 23 for Europe to deliver its “package” of economic measures to sustain the multilateral nuclear agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), within 10 days. An Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson later added that Russia and China must also endorse the European package.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani met with Chinese President Xi Jinping June 11 at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting in China. Xi said China was “determined to cement” economic relations with Iran and was “decisively against the U.S. unilateral move” to withdraw from the JCPOA and re-impose sanctions. Rouhani called for deepening the Iran-China relationship on banking and trade in national currencies.

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Excerpt:

Kelsey Davenport is director for nonproliferation policy at the Arms Control Association

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Countries do not have to be economically prosperous to move from high birth and death rates to low fertility and mortality rates. In India as the female literacy rate increased from 39 percent to 65 percent, the fertility rate dropped. These women pictured are studying an IT short course. Credit: Ranjita Biswas/IPS

By Ranjit Devraj
NEW DELHI, Jul 2 2018 (IPS)

Countries do not have to be economically prosperous to move from a situation of high birth and death rates to low fertility and mortality rates.

Education, social security, environments conducive to economic development and good value systems are what promote this, as evidenced by the recorded experiences of Asian countries as far apart as Japan and India.

According to Dr. Osamu Kusumoto, Secretary-General of the Asian Population Development Association, the economy and demographic transition or DT are indirectly rather than directly correlated.

Demographic transition is the theory that holds that countries move from a situation of high birth and death rates to low fertility and low mortality rates as they industrialise. However, in more recent times, the theory has been hit by contradictions and there are debates over whether industrialisation leads to declining population or whether lower populations lead to industrialisation and higher incomes.“At the same time the spread of healthcare and public health services promote mortality transition or lowered death rates. But, with real prosperity there is potential for fertility to rise again.”

Thus, according to Kusumoto, in high-income oil-producing countries, DT is unlikely to advance unless the countries also implement modern economic systems.

There are also debates around such inter-related DT issues as higher female incomes, old-age security and the demand for human capital with experiences differing across countries and regions.

As a country transitions, the cost of education rises creating relative poverty and promoting fertility transition, or a lowered birth rate, says Kusumoto. “At the same time the spread of healthcare and public health services promote mortality transition or lowered death rates. But with real prosperity there is potential for fertility to rise again.”

Kusumoto cites the example of Japan where, even with high per-capita incomes, people live in relative poverty and find unaffordable the high cost of educating children. “It is possible to say that fertility declines, even when social security systems are in place and old-age pensions are provided for, because people will make the rational choice of avoiding the cost of having children through marriage and childbirth.”

Japan’s birth rate is 1.44 per woman, which has caused the population to decline by one million in the last five years.

What people in Japan fail to realise, adds Kusumoto, is that without children the social security system becomes unsustainable and cannot support them in old age.

Meanwhile India, a developing country that is home to the world’s second-largest population, the total fertility rate has shown a steady decline from 3.6 per woman in 1991 to 2.4 per woman by 2011. Over that 20-year period per capita incomes rose from 1,221 dollars to 3,755 dollars, going by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) figures.

During the same period the female literacy rate increased from 39 percent to 65 percent. Also the composite human development index score of the UNDP, which combines education, health and income, rose from 0.428 in 1990 to 0.609 in 2014.

A closer look at the statistics at the district levels shows curious results such as that in eight Indian states, where there was a drop in the use of modern contraceptive methods, fertility had decreased, according to studies by the International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS) in Mumbai.

Professor Sanjay Kumar Mohanty at the IIPS says that disaggregated analyses at the district level are important since the districts are the focus of planning and programme implementation in India, including the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). “Such analyses may throw light on the unexplained decrease in fertility levels.”

According to an IIPS study published in 2016, while most of India’s 640 districts experience substantial declines over the 1991-2011 period, no clear relationship between initial levels and subsequent changes was discernible.

In the Indian experience, says Mohanty, female education and literacy have been associated with the use of modern contraceptives, higher age at marriage and birth spacing.

According to Kusumoto, in order to achieve the SDGs, what is needed is mortality transition as well as fertility transition. “We need to design a system where young people can have children if they wish to do so.”

Advances in medicine and public health and the availability of healthcare services will inevitably lead to mortality transition, says Kusumoto. “But unless there is also fertility transition, the population will continue to increase beyond the Earth’s carrying capacity.” 

While fertility control was successfully promoted using healthcare-based family planning and services, as in the case of India, from the 1960s onwards Western Europe and more recently East Asia began to see fertility rates falling below mortality rates in a “second demographic transition,” Kusumoto says, adding that research is still lacking on why exactly low fertility occurs. 

A notable example of the unpredictability showed up in the rapid DT in China’s Sichuan province during a study carried out in the 1980s by Toshio Kuroda, a winner of the U.N. Population Award. Kuroda noticed that DT happened despite the province’s low gross national product, making it an exceptional case of the economic DT theory.   

While there is a correlation between the economy and DT there are clear cases where it is not the economy but changes in people’s norms and values that bring about positive transition.

The exceptional changes that took place in the former Soviet countries may be attributed to a shift from communism to a market economy, which people accepted as rational. A World Bank report shows that Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan all had birth rates of 6 children per woman in 1950-55, but this declined by almost half by 2000. It was a decline also experienced by other former Soviet countries that previously had high birth rates. All former Soviet countries also showed increased life expectancy.

In the end, says Kusumoto, what is important is policies that promote “appropriate fertility transition” and are aimed at building a society in which “human dignity is maintained as envisioned in the SDGs.”

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• To Have Children or Not: The Importance of Finding a Balance

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Sit-in of Syrian migrants. Credit: IPS

By Carmen Arroyo and Emily Thampoe
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 2 2018 (IPS)

On World Refugee Day June 20, the Hungarian Parliament passed the ‘Stop Soros’ bill which is aimed at criminalizing groups who support refugees and other types of undocumented immigrants.

The government also proposed a 25% migration tax on any organization which deals with immigration in any way. With these measures, the nonprofit sector is experimenting a full drawback in the country.

Aron Demeter, the Media Manager of Amnesty International Hungary, told IPS that this bill “might have a chilling effect on the wider civil society in Hungary”.

This bill comes at a tumultuous time, what with similar ideas and protocols being discussed within the United States. Also just this week, dozens of representatives from refugee-led organizations met in Geneva with UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for the first Global Summit on Refugees, during which they have been developing structures for a global network of refugees.

In Hungary, the sentiment is the contrary from that of the United Nations. The ‘Stop Soros’ bill is named after a notable philanthropist and financialist George Soros, who is known for being involved with Hungarian rights organizations.

Abroad, Soros has been known to support American progressive political issues, even establishing the Open Society Foundation, which in the foundation’s words works to, “build vibrant and tolerant societies whose governments are accountable and open to the participation of all people”.

Led by the conservative government of prime minister Viktor Orban and its party Fidesz (Hungarian Civic Alliance), the Stop Soros law includes prison time for groups that help illegal immigrants get documents to remain in the country and limitations for NGOs to prevent them of assisting in asylum cases.

Along with these measures and the aforementioned law, the Parliament approved a constitutional amendment which said that foreigners cannot stay in Hungary.

While the bill has not been signed and enacted yet, it will be rather impactful when it is law. According to Amnesty, these new additions to Hungarian law, “pose a serious threat to the right to seek asylum; the freedoms of association, assembly, expression, and movement; the right to housing and associated economic and social rights; and the right to be free from discrimination, in violation of international human rights law and regional law”.

Charlie Yaxley, UNHCR Spokesperson for Asia and Europe, told IPS: “It is our concern that these laws will further inflame what is already a hostile public discourse around refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants and will fuel xenophobic attitudes.”

Hungary has been restricting its immigration policies since the start of the refugee crisis, and with the reelection of Fidesz last April, the country is willing to pass more restrictive legislation in order to protect its Christian identity.

However, with these measures Hungary is slowly drifting away from Western Europe, and the international community is outraged by it. The international system, led by the United Nations, has expressed its discontent with the bill.

Demeter, from Amnesty International, said “Many international actors from the UN, CoE, EU or other stakeholders have openly criticised the adoption of the law and the government’s anti-NGO campaign. We expect the European Commission to launch an infringement procedure and – in case their assessment is the same as ours – take it to CJEU.

“We also expect that MEPs – the EP plenary is going to vote on the possible launch of the Article 7 against Hungary in September – will deem this bill as one of the clear signs that the Hungarian government is systematically neglects the core European values and rules”.

When asked for Amnesty’s views on the present bill, Demeter responded: “The recently adopted STOP Soros is a new low and it “perfectly” fits into the Hungarian government’s witch-hunt against human rights NGOs that has started in 2013”.

He added: “The vague and absurd new bill – by criminalizing totally lawful activities – aims to silence those NGOs who are critical towards the government’s cruel and unlawful refugee and migration policies and other human rights issues. Though the bill at least on the surface aims to put in jail only those who are helping asylum-seekers and refugees, the message is very clear: if you are critical, you are the enemy of the government”.

Yaxley also shared with IPS UNHCR’s views on the impact of the bill on refugees: “What we may see happen to people who have been forced to flee their homes due to war, violence, and persecution, many who have been through traumatic experiences and are simply looking to exercise their fundamental human right to seek asylum, is that they might be deprived of critical aid and services.”

However, according to the Interior Minister Sandor Pinter in a document attached to the draft of the bill, “The STOP Soros package of bills serves that goal, making the organisation of illegal immigration a criminal offence. We want to use the bills to stop Hungary from becoming a country of immigrants”.

The nonprofit sector

Many international NGOs in Hungary will be targeted with this bill. Amnesty International is one of them. “Amnesty International Hungary is one of the organisations that are in the target of the government for many years.

Amnesty International many times has been named as an organisation “supporting illegal migration”. Since the law is vague and incomprehensible from a legal perspective nobody knows what is going to happen”, said Demeter.

Yaxley from UNHCR told IPS that this bill will definitely be a drawback for the nonprofit work in Hungary: “The key aspect is the additional financial requirements that are set to be placed on any NGOs that receive foreign funding. Our understanding is that our own funding [UNHCR’s] could potentially fall under this clause.”

“This may lead to a situation where essentially NGOs feel unable or unwilling to provide assistance that is really needed for refugees and asylum seekers that often arrive to countries with nothing more than the clothes on their backs or a handful of necessities.”

When asked about the repercussions after the bill is implemented, Demeter said: “Amnesty is committed to stay in Hungary and do its job just as in the previous nearly 30 years. We are going to fight against the law in front of every domestic and international court as possible”.

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By WAM
DUBAI, Jul 2 2018 (WAM)

The UAE is ideally positioned to serve as the ‘beating heart’ of a regional innovation hub; according to a new report published by Oliver Wyman in collaboration with Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC), the leading international financial hub in the Middle East, Africa and South Asia (MEASA) region.

Titled “The Case for an Innovation Hub to Facilitate MEASA Financial Inclusion”, the report reveals how Dubai is strategically positioned to facilitate development of digitally enabled financial solutions for the region.

There has been a significant push for the advancement of financial inclusion globally with 1.7 billion of the world’s global working population still lacking access to formal financial services. Nearly 50 percent of all financially excluded and underserved individuals are currently situated in the MEASA region. An average of 48 percent of the working adult population owns a financial account compared to a global average of 69 percent, and conditions across MEASA continue to constrain access to both traditional and digital financial services for the currently financially excluded population.

“In a financially inclusive environment, individuals and businesses can conveniently access a variety of financial services at low cost and are offered products that are tailored to their specific needs. For a significant share of the population across MEASA this is currently not possible. While many existing efforts are underway across the region, these are often heavily fragmented and make a large-scale advancement challenging,” said Greg Rung, Partner, Financial Services.

“There is an urgent need for reforms to overcome this disparity. This however requires the collaboration of a broad array of stakeholders from across the financial, technology and government sectors. Given their rapid evolution, digital technologies are a critical catalyst in achieving financial inclusion. The proposed hub will support centralisation of efforts and identify opportunities for scalable solutions,” he added.

Dubai combines a unique set of features that ideally position it to become the centre of the innovation hub. It is already recognised as a global and regional economic and financial hub with strong financial expertise. In addition, Dubai’s commitment to financial innovation is embedded in its financial services and national visions, such as Smart Dubai and Dubai Plan 2021.

Arif Amiri, Chief Executive Officer at the DIFC Authority, said, “With an approximate population of 3 billion, the MEASA region sits on a large pool of opportunities that are still untapped for the lack of financial access. Delivering financial services to more people across the region has become a necessity that Dubai, and the UAE as a whole, are perfectly positioned to contribute to. The world-class infrastructure and innovation ecosystem that Dubai has built, and continues to enhance, provide an enabling environment for technology and disruptive businesses to create more inclusive solutions and services for the entire region.”

He added, “At DIFC, financial inclusion remains a key focus for us in our ongoing efforts to shape the future of finance in MEASA. We have already made important strides towards nurturing an integrated ecosystem that can unlock the potential of emerging trends such as FinTech and InsurTech in the region. We believe that this will not only transform the way the financial services industry operates, but will also create a positive wave of social impact and economic gains across the MEASA countries. This is why we remain focused on continuing our efforts to foster financial innovation in the region and lead the necessary evolution for greater financial inclusion for its people.”

DIFC is the leading financial centre and FinTech hub in the MEASA region, with over 1,853 active registered companies and a Fintech community of over 50 firms and numerous FinTech-related clients. DIFC’s FinTech ecosystem comprises FinTech Hive at DIFC, the region’s first accelerator programme, as well as an innovation testing license, a special operating license, an interactive and collaborative workspace, along with access to the largest financial community in the region.

 

WAM/Rasha Abubaker

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Rescued migrants being tended to by IOM staff in Tripoli. Credit: IOM

By International Organization for Migration
GENEVA, Jul 1 2018 (IOM)

This weekend, some 204 migrants have died at sea off Libya, pushing the total number of migrant drownings in the entire Mediterranean so far this year to over 1,000 people.

Today (1/07), a small rubber boat packed with migrants capsized off AlKhums, east of Tripoli, with an estimated 41 people surviving after rescue. On Friday (28/06), three babies were among the 103, who died in a shipwreck similar to Sunday’s incident, also caused by smugglers taking migrants to sea in completely unsafe vessels.

So far this year, the Libyan Coast Guard has returned some 10,000 people to shore from small vessels.

“I am traveling to Tripoli once again this week and will see firsthand the conditions of migrants who have been rescued as well as those returned to shore by the Libya Coast Guard,” said William Lacy Swing, IOM Director General. “IOM is determined to ensure that the human rights of all migrants are respected as together we all make efforts to stop the people smuggling trade, which is so exploitative of migrants,” said Swing.

IOM staff were deployed to provide support and first aid to the the 41 migrants who survived the capsize of their small rubber vessel that capsized off AlKhums. This is the second major shipwreck in as many few days. On Friday, a rubber dinghy capsized north of Tripoli and the 16 survivors (young men from Gambia, Sudan, Yemen, Niger and Guinea) were rescued by the Libyan Cost Guard. However, an estimated 103 people lost their lives.

Adding to grim and tragic scene, the bodies of three babies were taken from the sea by the Libyan Coast Guard. IOM provided assistance at the disembarkation point, including provision of food and water and health assistance. IOM is also in the process of providing psychosocial aid at Tajoura detention centre where the survivors have been transferred. The need for physcosocial support is high as the survivors spent traumatizing time in the water as their engine broke only 30 minutes after departing Garaboli. The survivors have received psychosocial first aid at the detention centre and IOM continues to monitor their condition.

From Friday to Sunday, close to 1,000 migrants were returned to Libyan shore by the Libyan Coast Guard, who intercepted small crafts as they made their way towards the open sea. Upon disembarkation to shore, migrants have received emergency direct assistance, including food and water, health assistance and IOM protection staff has provided vulnerability interviews. Those rescued and returned by the Libyan Coast Guard are transferred by the Libyan authorities to the detention centres where IOM continues humanitarian assistance.

“There is an alarming increase in deaths at sea off Libya Coast,” said IOM Libya Chief of Mission Othman Belbeisi, adding: “Smugglers are exploiting the desperation of migrants to leave before there are further crackdowns on Mediterranean crossings by Europe.”

“Migrants returned by the coast guard should not automatically be transferred to detention and we are deeply concerned that the detention centres will yet again be overcrowded and that living conditions will deteriorate with the recent influx of migrants,” added Belbeisi.

Two other search and rescue operations by the Libyan Coast Guard are currently ongoing.

For more, information please contact:

Christine Petre IOM Libya, Email: CPetre@iom.int Tel + 216 577 9636
Leonard Doyle IOM Spokesperson, Email: ldoyle@iom.int, Tel: +41 792857123

You can view this statement online here.

The post Over 200 Migrants Drown in Three Days in Mediterranean — Death Toll for 2018 Passes 1,000 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Rashid Amjad
Jun 30 2018 (Dawn, Pakistan)

Do forgive the people of this country if they cannot make sense of our present economic predicament. On one hand, they are told repeatedly (and correctly) that the economy has started reaping the benefits of CPEC — the ‘game changer’ — in the form of significantly reduced load-shedding, an upturn in investment and a not unimpressive recovery in economic growth. At the same time, they are told that the economy is in dire straits!

A severe foreign exchange crisis threatens to reverse significantly the recent economic upturn. Our import bill exceeds our export earnings, including remittances, and if we add to it the repayments due on foreign loans, the gap is immense: $25 billion or over eight per cent of GDP. The country’s foreign exchange reserves are fast running out. We have already reached the critical level of just two months of imports. The alarm bells are ringing as foreign exchange reserves continue to lose almost $1bn a month. We must now wake up to the reality that, unless we can raise $8bn to $10bn in new loans and obtain a roll-over of existing debts, we could well face default on our debt payments — which is a polite way of saying ‘bankruptcy’.

The current state of economic affairs requires that some important decisions be taken.

The economic problem we now face cannot be traced solely to the previous government’s stubborn refusal to adjust the overvalued exchange rate. Our economic managers appear to have lost the plot over the last two years. For one, they were unable to keep track of CPEC-funded investment flows, whose exact form of financing has never been made transparent. The second and perhaps more important reason for our plight is that the federal and some provincial governments decided to go on a spending spree — launching projects, oblivious to their cost and foreign exchange implications. This is not new: the last two governments were equally guilty.

The current state of economic affairs cannot be allowed to continue. Some important decisions may need to be taken in the crunch, even by the interim government in the national interest. The simple reason for this is that, unless some immediate measures are taken to restore business confidence and, most importantly, to calm the foreign exchange market, the exchange rate will continue to fall. In the extreme scenario, we could enter a freefall situation. Given this uncertainty, anybody with some staying power will not be willing to part with their US dollars, betting that the rupee will fall even more. Those wanting foreign exchange will be chasing less and less available in the market.

Yet, nobody will bail us out, whether it is the IMF or anyone else, without imposing ‘conditionalities’ — primarily to ensure that they get their money back. Here, our team of negotiators (from the finance ministry and State Bank) must learn some lessons from the past. The last two governments entered into agreements with the IMF almost immediately upon coming into power. The 2008 agreement with the IMF was an unmitigated disaster in terms of its impact on growth, which fell from near 6pc to less than 1pc. The economy never quite recovered after that. The 2013 agreement, partly due to the groundwork done by the interim finance team, was able to avoid this shock through a more gradual decline in the fiscal deficit. However, agreeing almost immediately to a reforms agenda was unwise. To the extent possible, the new government should seek some time to finalise the content and sequencing of economic reforms, for which it can take full ownership and deliver.

The immediate challenge will be to agree to a stabilisation package, at an appropriate speed and sequencing of adjustment, that protects the country’s economic interests. Despite its weak bargaining position, the government should work towards a stabilisation package in which the burden of adjustment primarily falls in a sequenced way on the fiscal deficit rather than on the exchange rate. This is not to deny that we need to adjust the exchange rate, but we must keep this limited to its current overvaluation. We must remain fully aware that the cost of a very steep devaluation is especially high for our heavily indebted economy. Doing so would also raise the value of imports, especially oil products, fuelling inflation and eroding competitiveness. To that extent, it would neutralise the gains from devaluation. Most importantly, it would increase the cost of our defence preparedness, which in the current volatile situation cannot be compromised at any cost.

Of course, cutting the fiscal deficit is not without cost, even if the decline is made gradual. A 2pc drop in the fiscal deficit would reduce our current GDP growth of around 6pc to near half this amount. Most importantly, to counteract this, we must put in place measures that allow the recent growth momentum to build on the revival of manufacturing and upturn in exports and create the climate to encourage the much-awaited revival in private investment. All this will ensure that the decline in GDP growth is minimised. The emphasis here should be on reversing the anti-export trade and tariff regime and making a serious attempt at cutting down on losses from public-sector enterprises. This should entail including workers and their elected representatives in any restructuring negotiations.

Over the medium to long term, the policy focus must shift to expediting coal mining in Thar (which could finally remove our dependency on imported oil and gas), preserving and supplementing our water resources, and switching the emphasis in education from merely increasing numbers to improving the quality of education imparted and the social skills of our graduates.

If seriously and successfully monitored and implemented, this agenda will likely keep the newly elected government busy through its term in office. Come 2023, it will be judged on these achievements. Inshallah.

The writer is professor at the Lahore School of Economics and former vice chancellor of the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics.

This story was originally published by Dawn, Pakistan

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By Imtiaz A Hussain
Jun 30 2018 (The Daily Star, Bangladesh)

Gideon Rose made an astute observation in editing the May/June 2018 Foreign Affairs cover story on the current “democratic regression”. “We have seen this movie before,” he quoted a Latin friend of his on the concurrent predicament, “just never in English.” That may be the missing element behind this “regression”: populism may be a popular explanation, since it brings to the fore many of the disturbing developments within mature democratic countries; stalled economic growth in these same countries also finds immense currency as a democracy detractor; historically-bent scholars never miss the beat to push the cliché that what goes up (for example, whatever led Francis Fukuyama to proclaim an “end of history” in the early 1990s), must eventually not only come down, but also begin climbing again. And so the story goes.

Yet rarely is the Anglo-Saxon anchor put under the spotlight these days. Even a cursory glance suggests, with a tweak here or a calibration there, democracy may still remain the fairest damsel among governmental types, if, and this is a big if, it is not pitched in a sine qua non mode.

Samuel P Huntington’s “wave” explanations get us to centre-stage. His first “wave” did not happen in England and the United States by chance from the early 19th Century, nor could it have soared high enough to be noticed anywhere else, give or take fickle France. How the 16th Century enclosure movement evicted tenant farmers and peasants, privatised the commons, and converted society into a cash-economy playground paved the long and tortuous journey towards the individualism democracy demands. Even then it took the entire 19th Century, not to mention the opening quarter of the 20th Century, to build the one-person, one-vote hallmark democratic feature.

Across the Atlantic a “born-free” country (that is, devoid of vested interests, since they promote parochial over national or global interests), was led down a different pathway. Dominated by only a handful of Anglo-Saxons fleeing monarchical abuses in England during the 17th and 18th centuries, the United States was virtually guaranteed nothing but a democratic future. Yet, this did not come automatically. As in Britain, a liberal market demanded a government from outside the prevalent box. Though the US Constitution enshrined democracy by 1787, the country still had to wait until 1964 before all adults could claim the one-person, one-vote privilege.

Both cases depict an ominously protracted journey to a representative government, demanding voluntarily engagements of its proponents/practitioners in exchange for returning as much more back to that society. This blended perfectly well with private enterprise, but it is the innovative capacity of private enterprise that permits democracy to replenish itself until perpetuity. Only by halting the process, or letting impediments intervene can democracy be disrupted. That, unfortunately, must be what has happened to produce infectious populism. Donald J Trump on yonder side of the Atlantic, and the Brexit vote, not to mention Dutch, French, German, Hungarian, and Italian electoral threats on this, portray today perhaps the sickest face of “English” democracy.

British colonies were expected to spearhead democracy. Frankly and fairly, Britain did whatever it could within its capacities; and that was a lot more than those other European countries boasting empires, whether it be Belgium in the African heartland, France across North Africa and Indo-China, Germany in Africa’s south, Italy in Abyssinia, Portugal in Brazil, or Spain across the rest of Latin America. By softening its noblesse oblige imperial approach, “English” democracy had the chance to prevail wherever the British Empire existed were it not for the coincidental emergence of the United States as not only the world leader, but also Cold War participant, after World War II. “English” democracy was hijacked, but only across the friendliest Atlantic waters.

Though still not perfectly democratic by that time (women had only just got the right to vote), the United States continued, for more than a century, to cultivate key institutions (like regular elections, stable parties, and foresighted leadership), just as Britain had done. This is the one area where Rose’s Foreign Affairs reference to “English” matters: the inability or unwillingness to permit new-born countries that same time-frame to sow and reap those very fundamental institutions. Britain may not have been behind the global steering-wheel, but in retrospect it can still boast producing one of the finest democracy-in-transition experiments among former colonies: India (even as the world’s largest democracy today faces one monumental democratic threat: religious fundamentalism).

If “blaming by default” is a lesser evil than “blaming by deliberation”, then the United States must take full responsibility for truncating what it preached: authentic democracy, not one as a tacky alternative to communism, nor as the appropriate outlet for foreign aid and investment. Beginning its world leadership on the wrong foot was enough to prevent fledgling countries from building new institutions upon democratic pillars and principles: instead of promoting the principles of its own Founding Fathers, the United States imposed a sine qua non condition that they reject communism first. A tragedy of errors followed, with dictator opponents of communism (from the Shah of Iran to Ferdinand Marcos, with an Ayub Khan here and Augusto Pinochet there, and gullible tyrants everywhere), quashing their country’s maiden democratic flag-bearers (be they Muhammed Mosaddegh, Benigno Simeon “Ninoy” Aquino, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, or Salvador Allende Gossens). No more fatal a blow could have been inflicted upon democracy and its future than that. No wonder the third and fourth democratic “waves” from the 1980s and late 1990s fell short of delivering: the critical institutions were just not there to absorb the soaring expectations; and it was pathetic to expect them to grow overnight under military command, as in Afghanistan and Iraq, in the 21st Century, as they had done under starkly different circumstances in post-World War II Germany and Japan.

Though this “Third World” or “Fourth World” malaise may not be that far from the heart of the current “democratic regression”, which is the Atlantic seaboard, it did feed western populism after the Cold War atmosphere permitted another opportunity for democratisation: their low-waged or import-substitution policy approaches that were encouraged during the Cold War to prevent communist penetration (as across Latin America), now threatened western economies, particularly driving university-educated students into abysmal unemployment.

It may be far too late to turn back the clock (and the policy approaches) to retrieve democracy; but amid the less liberal democracy sprouting, we should be looking where the sun rises to capture the new democratic contours. They will not be picture perfect until they experience their centuries of institution-building trials and errors, as with the “English”; but that might still be a better alternative to the monarchical/dictatorial impulses that gave birth to democracy in the first place several centuries ago.

Dr Imtiaz A Hussain is the head of Global Studies & Governance Program at Independent University, Bangladesh (IUB).

This story was originally published by The Daily Star, Bangladesh

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By WAM
THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS, Jun 30 2018 (WAM)

A UAE delegation, led by Dr. Thani bin Ahmed Al-Zeyoudi, Minister of Climate Change and Environment, has concluded a three-day official visit to the Netherlands.

The delegates explored key topics of mutual interest with Dutch officials, including the use of smart technologies, such as artificial intelligence and precision agriculture to improve the quantity and quality of agricultural production and combat plant pests and diseases.

Other members of the delegation comprised Dr. Kaltham Kayaf, Head of the Animal Health Section at the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment; Abdul Nasser Al Shamsi, CEO of Rawafed; Omar Al Jundi, CEO of Badia Farms; and Mohammed Khalfan, General Manager of Al Dahra Holding.

From 26th to 28th June, the delegation met Carola Schouten, Dutch Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality; Sigrid Kaag, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation; Cora van Nieuwenhuizen, Minister of Infrastructure and Water Management; Marcel Beukeboom, Special Envoy for Climate Change; and Reina Buijs, Deputy Director-General for International Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The delegates explored new areas of cooperation with relevant entities in the Netherlands and exchanged experience in climate change research. Discussions focused on leveraging the latest technologies to collect climate data that can be used to shape strategies and policies.

Dr. Al Zeyoudi highlighted the National Climate Change Plan of the UAE 2017-2050, its vision and project deliverables. The plan garnered high praise from the Dutch officials as an impressive contribution to global efforts in combating the impacts of climate change.

Speaking about the visit, Dr. Al Zeyoudi said, ” The UAE enjoys deep-rooted ties with the Netherlands that bind our two nations on multiple fronts. Our visit aimed to build on our strong bilateral relations and identify new opportunities for collaboration. We also sought to share expertise in relevant areas and lay a solid foundation for future partnerships between the private and public sectors in both countries.”

As part of the agenda, the delegates toured Deltares an institute for applied research in the field of water, subsurface and infrastructure where they learned about climate change, groundwater and salinity modelling methods used in the Netherlands.

During their visit to the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research and the Energy Research Centre of the Netherlands, the delegation inspected an integrated system for improving air quality through storing and recycling carbon dioxide for use in diverse sectors.

Moreover, the delegation toured the Wageningen University and Research a world-class educational institution dedicated to life sciences, agriculture and environmental science and received a briefing on the environment-related majors offered at the university.

 

WAM/Hazem Hussein/Tariq alfaham

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In the community of Paropucjio, several women stand next to the solar greenhouse they have just built together on the plot of land belonging to one of them, in the district of Cusipata, more than 3,300 metres above sea level in the Cuzco highlands region in Peru. They get excited when they talk about how the greenhouses will improve their families' lives. Credit: Mariela Jara/IPS

By Mariela Jara
CUSIPATA, Peru, Jun 30 2018 (IPS)

At more than 3,300 m above sea level, in the department of Cuzco, women are beating infertile soil and frost to grow organic food and revive community work practices that date back to the days of the Inca empire in Peru such as the “ayni” and “minka”.

“We grow maize, beans and potatoes, that’s what we eat, and we forget about other vegetables, but now we’re going to be able to naturally grow tomatoes, lettuce, and peas,” María Magdalena Condori told IPS, visibly pleased with the results, while showing her solar greenhouse, built recently in several days of community work.

She lives in the Andes highlands village of Paropucjio, located at more than 3,300 m above sea level, in Cusipata, a small district of less than 5,000 inhabitants."We want to help improve the quality of life of rural women by strengthening their capacities in agriculture. They work the land, they sow and harvest, they take care of their families, they are the mainstay of food security in their homes and their rights are not recognized." -- Elena Villanueva

The local population subsists on small-scale farming and animal husbandry, which is mainly done by women, while most of the men find paid work in districts in the area or even in the faraway city of Cuzco, to complete the family income.

The geographical location of Paropucjio is a factor in the low fertility of the soils, in addition to the cold, with temperatures that drop below freezing. “Here, frost can destroy all our crops overnight and we end up with no food to eat,” says Celia Mamani, one of Condori’s neighbors.

A similar or even worse situation can be found in the other 11 villages that make up Cusipata, most of which are at a higher altitude and are more isolated than Paropucjio, which is near the main population centre in Cusipata and has the largest number of families, about 120.

Climate change has exacerbated the harsh conditions facing women and their families in these rural areas, especially those who are furthest away from the towns, because they have fewer skills training opportunities to face the new challenges and have traditionally been neglected by public policy-makers.

“In Paropucjio there are 14 of us women who are going to have our own greenhouse and drip irrigation module; so far we have built five. This makes us very happy, we are proud of our work because we will be able to make better use of our land,” said Rosa Ysabel Mamani the day that IPS spent visiting the community.

The solar greenhouses will enable each of the beneficiaries to grow organic vegetables for their families and to sell the surplus production in the markets of Cusipata and nearby districts.

Women farmers from Paropucjio, in the district of Cusipata, more than 3,300 metres above sea level, smile as they talk about the wooden structure for a solar greenhouse, which they jokingly refer to as a “skeleton”. The roof will be made of a special microfilm resistant to bad weather, intense ultraviolet radiation and extreme temperatures, and the greenhouses are built collectively, in the Andean region of Cuzco, Peru. Credit: Mariela Jara/IPS

With a broad smile, Mamani points to a 50-sq-m wooden structure that within the next few days will be covered with mesh on the sides and microfilm – a plastic resistant to extreme temperatures and hail – on the roof.

“We will all come with our husbands and children and we will finish building the greenhouse in ‘ayni’ (a Quechua word that means cooperation and solidarity), as our ancestors used to work,” she explains.

The ayni is one of the social forms of work of the Incas still preserved in Peru’s Andes highlands, where the community comes together to build homes, plant, harvest or perform other tasks. At the end of the task, in return, a hearty meal is shared.

The minga, another legacy of the Inca period, is similar but between communities, whose inhabitants go to help those of another community. In this case women from different villages and hamlets get together to build the greenhouses, especially the roofs, the hardest part of the job.

Training in production and rights

A total of 80 women from six rural highlands districts in Cuzco will benefit from the solar greenhouses and drip irrigation modules for their family organic gardens, as part of a project run by the non-governmental Peruvian Flora Tristán Women’s Centre with the support of the Spanish Basque Agency for Development Cooperation.

Women farmers from the community of Huasao, in the Andean highlands region of Cuzco, Peru, stand in front of one of the 50-sq-m solar tents, which has a 750-litre water tank for the drip irrigation module for their vegetables. Credit: Mariela Jara/IPS

“We want to help improve the quality of life of rural women by strengthening their capacities in agriculture. They work the land, they sow and harvest, they take care of their families, they are the mainstay of food security in their homes and their rights are not recognised,” Elena Villanueva, a sociologist with the centre’s rural development programme, told IPS.

She said the aim was comprehensive training for women farmers, so that they can use agro-ecological techniques for the sustainable use of soil, water and seeds. They will also learn to defend their rights as women, farmers and citizens, in their homes, community spaces and before local authorities.

The expert said the solar greenhouses open up new opportunities for women because they protect crops from adverse weather and from the high levels of ultraviolet radiation in the area, allowing the women to grow crops that could not survive out in the open.

“Now they will have year-round food that is not currently part of their diet, such as cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes and lettuce, that will enrich the nutrition and diets in their families – crops they will be able to plant and harvest with greater security,” she said.

The women have also been trained in the preparation of natural fertilisers and pesticides. “Our soils don’t yield much, they squeeze the roots of the plants, so we have to prepare them very well so that they can receive the seeds and then provide good harvests,” Condori explains.

In the 50 square metres covered by her new greenhouse, the local residents have worked steadily digging the soil to remove the stones, turn the soil and form the seed beds for planting.

Women and men from the community of Paropucjio, in Peru’s Andes highlands region of Cuzco, share lunch after completing the community work of building one of 80 small greenhouses, where women farmers will be able to grow organic vegetables despite the extreme temperatures in the area. Credit: Mariela Jara/IPS

“To do that we have had to fertilise a lot using bocashi (fermented organic fertiliser) that we prepare in groups with the other women, working together in ayni. We brought guinea pig and chicken droppings and cattle manure, leaves, and ground eggshells,” she explains.

This active role in making decisions about the use of their productive resources has helped change the way their husbands see them and has brought a new appreciation for everything they do to support the household and their families.

Honorato Ninantay, from the community of Huasao, located more than 3,100 metres above sea level in the neighbouring district of Oropesa, confesses his surprise and admiration for the way his wife juggles all her responsibilities.

“It seems unbelievable that before, in all this time, I hadn’t noticed. Only when she has gone to the workshops and has been away from home for two days have I understood,” he says.

“I as a man have only one job, I work in construction. But my wife has aahh! (long exclamation). When she left I had to fetch the water, cook the meals, feed the animals, go to the farm and take care of my mother who is sick and lives with us. I couldn’t handle it all,” he adds.

His wife, Josefina Corihuamán, listens to her husband with a smile on her face, and confirms that he is now involved in household chores because he has understood that washing, cleaning and cooking are not just a “woman’s job.”

She also has a solar greenhouse and irrigation module and is confident that she will produce enough to feed her family and sell the surplus in the local market.

“What we will harvest will be healthy, organic, chemical-free food, and that is good for our families, for our children. I feel that I will finally make good use of my land,” she says.

Related Articles

• Women Farmers in Peru Bring Healthy Meals to Local Schools
• Solar Tents Improve Nutrition in Highlands Villages in Bolivia
• For the Rural Poor of Peru, the Social Agenda is Far Away
• Rights of Rural Women Have Seen Uneven Progress in Latin America

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By International Organization for Migration
GENEVA, Jun 29 2018 (IOM)

On Friday 29 June 2018, the member states of the IOM, the United Nations Migration Agency, elected Portugal’s António Manuel de Carvalho Ferreira Vitorino as the International Organization for Migration’s next Director General.

António Manuel de Carvalho Ferreira Vitorino

Mr. Vitorino, 61 (DOB 12 January 1957), succeeds the United States’ William Lacy Swing, who is leaving IOM after serving two five-year terms as Director General. Mr. Vitorino’s directorship begins on 1 October 2018.

The latest IOM director general is a former European Commissioner for Justice and Home Affairs (1999-2004) and former Minister of the Presidency and National Defence (1995-1997). He has also enjoyed a distinguished career in Portugal as a lawyer as well as in electoral politics.

Mr. Vitorino was elected to Portugal’s Parliament in 1980. In 1983 he became Secretary of State for Parliamentary Affairs. He later served as Deputy Secretary for the Governor of Macau until 1989, when he returned to Lisbon to become a judge of the Constitutional Court, a term that ended in 1994. He subsequently served as Minister for National Defence and Deputy Prime Minister within the government of António Guterres, now the United Nations’ Secretary General.

From 1999 to 2004 António Vitorino served as the European Commissioner for Justice and Home Affairs. During his tenure, Mr. Vitorino participated in conversations that led to the drawing of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and the Convention on the Future of Europe.

Since exiting politics in 2005, Mr. Vitorino has returned to law, serving as a partner with the firm of Cuatrecasas, Gonçalves Pereira & Associados. Vitorino has been President of the think tank Notre Europe since June 2011 and for many years enjoyed an ongoing role as commentator for the leading Portuguese television channel RTP 1.

António Vitorino earned a degree from the University of Lisbon’s School of Law in 1981, as well as a Master’s Degree in Legal and Political Science. Mr. Vitorino has authored works on Constitutional Law, Political Science, European Community Law, and was also a member of the Drafting Committee of the Portuguese White Book on Corporate Governance.

Established in 1951, International Organization for Migration has over 10,000 staff and over 400 offices in more than 150 countries. IOM is the UN Migration Agency and is the leading inter-governmental organisation in the field of migration. It is committed to the principle that humane and orderly migration benefits migrants and society.

IOM works with its partners in the international community to assist in meeting operational challenges of migration, advance understanding of migration issues and to encourage social and economic development through migration while upholding the well-being and human rights of all migrants.

IOM provides services and advice to governments and migrants to help ensure the orderly and humane management of migration, to promote international cooperation on migration issues, to assist in the search for practical solutions to migration problems and to provide humanitarian assistance to migrants in need, including refugees and internally displaced people.

IOM was granted permanent observer status to the UN General Assembly in 1992. A cooperation agreement between IOM and the UN was signed in 1996. IOM joined the UN system as a related organization in September 2016, when the agreement outlined in GA res.70/296 (2016) was signed during the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants.

For further information please contact Leonard Doyle at IOM HQ, Tel: +41 792857123, Email: ldoyle@iom.int

You can view this statement online here.

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Credit: iStockphoto.com/ peepo

By Pablo Alabarces
BUENOS AIRES, Jun 29 2018 (IPS)

Football tells us a great deal about identity. Even a budding sports journalist knows that. And it has come to be a meeting point and even an advertising theme. But what we never discuss is the varying forms of this identity that are possible, let alone the consequences, which are sometimes ill-fated.

Saying that football is tied to identity is comforting because it places higher status on it than just a triviality: it allows us to emphatically claim that “soccer is the most important of the least important things” (another triviality).

Of course, this importance is derived precisely from the fact that it comprises a series of memories and stories in which very diverse identities are invented and adopted and from the fact that its effectiveness is based on its emotional warmth (the apparent “passion”), the potential beauty of the game (although rare, to be honest), and the unpredictability of the outcome.

But the comfort of identity overlooks—or conceals—that we have not explained anything with this; that we need to add another dimension that is indispensable (and generally covert): the dimension of power.

The dimensions of identity involved are not just the two most visible ones: identity at the micro or tribal level (the club, the team, the colors) and national identity (national team, country, homeland), although these also require our attention before we start celebrating.

The stories of identity that football involves—or has involved in Latin America in the past—have been centered on a wide variety of themes. At least in broad terms, these have included ethnicity, race, class, territory, and country—all of which were triggered by stories that—in some cases—labeled themselves as “playing styles”.

Ethnicity stems from the actual roots and conflicts among Europeans (not only the English), criollos and mestizos; class, from the sport’s popularization and the disputes over professionalization; race, from the appearance of those of African descent; territory, from the close relationship between teams and cities or towns (or neighborhoods in major cities).

And finally country, which found the ideal channel to popularize narratives of identity in soccer in 1916 and the appearance of international competitions. At the same time, however, there is something major missing – and not just in Latin America: the dimension of gender was silenced (as well as banned) in this discovery and in these stories.

Let us pause here and use this missing component to better illustrate the dimension of power. The commonality of identity sometimes overlooks the fact that these are essentially male identities and stories, that they were imposed as universal at the expense of censorship and the exclusion of football and female fandom.

To top it off, the culture of sports does not allow women to be a channel for identity narratives, since this is impossible based on a broader principle that is not just Latin American. According to this principle, the narrative of one’s homeland cannot be told from a female perspective and women cannot be the heroes in a nationalist story.

On the contrary, the excess of narratives—the effective excess of narratives—in male football ruled out the possibility of having a female story altogether, and even excluded it, as we have already noted.

Thus the aim here is not to celebrate identities, but to assess who creates them, who adopts them, and how they are narrated. And fundamentally, who they are narrated against. Because, as we know, every story of identity is also a story of otherness: what someone is and what someone isn’t.

In football, the prevailing story is that the one telling it is masculine: but the “other” is gay—not a woman—which doubles the exclusion of women in one fell swoop. It is a matter entirely for men, which in turn creates space for a homoerotic story and—paradoxically—a homophobic one.

This is an initial common ground for discrimination that was recently used in an unsuccessful ad by television broadcaster Torneos y Competencias [Latin American sports and entertainment service]: disguised as alleged criticism of Russia’s repression of homosexuality, the ad revealed the persistent anti-feminine discrimination established by football culture.

Racism and xenophobia

The same holds true for the concepts of ethnicity and race. Latin American soccer was built on top of an ethnic dispute (at times disguised as anti-imperialism) during the process of making a European-invented game more criollo. Once this initial stage was over, however, it gave rise to two conflicting junctures:

1. The national narratives of differentiation—Buenos Aires against provincial Argentina, Santiago against Valparaíso, Rio de Janeiro against São Paulo, coastal areas against the mountainside in Colombia, Ecuador, and to a lesser extent in Peru, and
2. The racialization of African-descendant ethnicity, a key concept that was crucial to the invention of “popular” soccer in Brazil, Uruguay, and Peru.

These concepts started to come into play at the international level in 1916: the Chilean league demanded that the points achieved by the Uruguayan team in the first South American Championship not be counted because they had “African players” on their roster.

At the 1921 South American Championship in Buenos Aires, Brazilian President Epitácio Pessoa stated his desire to have the Brazilian team made up of only white players since the year before, the Argentine press had called the Brazilians “little monkeys” when they passed through Buenos Aires on their way to the South American Championship in Chile.

This was not the first presence of racism in “white” Latin American societies; we are simply pointing out that football allowed this racism to establish itself from then on and gave it a competitive advantage.

Since the 1930s, all these concepts were primarily narrated by the mass media, with the resulting prevalence of stereotyping. The media uses stereotypes to create and tell narratives, simply because this is the method it has to readily put a chaotic world in order.

The problem comes when a stereotype also dictates our understanding of the world since no other story lines can be found. Here we see the problem of power once again: the narrators were—and mostly still are—white and middle class, so all their narratives were created from these perspectives.

The prevailing voice and practically the only perspective throughout the Americas is still white, urban, and middle class. The best example of this in football is in Brazil, where it was revealed that an apparent racial democracy was achieved starting in 1958, with its first World Cup title in Sweden, led by its star players Vavá, Didí, Pelé, and Garrincha. Three black men and a mulatto. But this revelation was made and publicized by educated white men: Gilberto Freyre and Mário Filho.

A discriminatory celebration

The aim here is not to attribute the homophobic, xenophobic, and racist excesses of Latin American fans to mass culture, however. Mass culture simply sets the stage for the prevailing stories such that broadly homophobic, xenophobic, and racist societies cannot avoid having these characteristics in their mass culture, and thus in their soccer.

Due to its massiveness, soccer provides greater visibility of these narratives and sets the stage for the masses. These are not every day racist acts. Instead, it is a crowd berating the blackness of a particular soccer player in mostly white societies. The xenophobic narrative, in turn, is disguised as a joke.

Sports journalists think very highly of their own humor and believe mutual bashing between Chileans and Peruvians, Argentines and Brazilians, or Colombians and Venezuelans can be adopted based on the argument of tradition (“that the way it’s always been”) and humor (“not seriously”).

The outlook is thus dreadful. FIFA regulations appear to have achieved few results in the world of UEFA, let alone in the world of CONMEBOL. It is possible that this relative lack of success is due to an issue of power.

The ones who make these rules—for the sake of political correctness—are members of the same groups that can and do discriminate on multiple bases (white, urban, and rich, if possible). In the case of Argentina, no one seriously believes that it is that bad to call a rival “black,” “Bolivian,” or “fag”—it’s a “guy thing,” said in the heat of the moment during the game. It is certainly not possible to find fault with tens of thousands of fans who are simply adopting the ethics of their dominant classes, either.

It will take far more than a few well-written disciplinary rules to potentially undo this process. Last August, Frank Fabra—a Colombian player of African descent, who plays for Argentina’s Boca Juniors—was insulted by rival fans of “Estudiantes de la Plata” [Argentine professional sports club based in La Plata] with predictable shouts of “black,” “fag,” and “Colombian.” The referee decided not to interrupt the game, claiming that the shouting did not come from the entire stadium.

So, as we said: it was just a joke.

The link to the original article: https://www.fes-connect.org/trending/football-xenophobia-racism-discrimination-and-a-few-more-things/

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Excerpt:

Pablo Alabarces holds a PhD in Sociology from the University of Brighton, England. He is Professor of Popular Culture at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Buenos Aires and has published several books on football and popular culture.

The post Football, Xenophobia, Racism, Discrimination– & a Few More Things appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By MA. Isabel Ongpin
Jun 29 2018 (Manila Times)

One of the most nightmarish experiences that any Filipino or foreigner can experience in this country (if they survive) is to spend time in our prisons. Thus, every kind of maneuver is made by those who manage to avoid incarceration — be it suddenly getting sick after years of carrying on healthily and checking into a hospital with a convenient serious diagnosis of illness from a compliant doctor, to effectively running away from the law and becoming a fugitive. Other variations of escaping the brutish conditions that our prisons have been allowed to come to, is to ask a judge to order confinement at the NBI or the PNP temporary incarceration places where the public is on view and vice versa. Then perhaps the conditions are less obviously dreadful, the bullies or other evil denizens that prisons have within their bowels are on public view, a minority, and therefore controllable.

Ma. Isabel Ongpin

High-profile convicts of means who finally cannot avoid being incarcerated in the national penitentiary, are somehow able to make arrangements through money or influence to be given accommodations such as a kubo (hut) outside the main buildings, where the privileged prisoner is relatively alone or with chosen companions and in possession of amenities like airconditioning, appliances and other comforts not inherent in prisons. If there is a sudden inspection or stricter implementation of rules, the convict may temporarily have to be present for the roll call in the morning and at night the main prison building from where he goes back to his kubo. But at least he gets a good night’s sleep.

Uncomfortable to dreadful to horrible as conditions are in the national penitentiaries, far worse are the city jails where prisoners who have not been tried, have no date for their trials, are seemingly forgotten by the authorities, are packed without any concern to the conditions of overcrowding, the resulting heat from too many bodies in one place and the unsupervised behavior of one to another. The lack of fresh air, the inability to lie down or sit down, maybe having to keep standing for lack of space, brings out the worst in those who have to endure it. Here sleep is impossible except in relays. These are the ultimate hellholes of prisons that we have allowed to degenerate far below humane standards of confinement.

Our prisons are grossly and dangerously overcrowded. Under these conditions, bullies and their supporters (for self-defense and for whatever reason) proliferate, cannot be controlled and cause mayhem, havoc and murder. The weak, the inexperienced, the young become victims.

Police authorities or prison custodians are few and the prisoners are many. That is one reason why these custodians are apt to be distant, even afraid of the mass of prisoners so that they are allowed to rampage. Some authorities prefer to let the toughies persecute the meek, a sin of omission that brings on dire consequences.

No need to tally here the kind of food given from the miserable budget allowed, beside the number of prisoners to be fed.

Human dignity and humanitarian conditions are not in the universe of these prisoners. These prison conditions have been here for decades. Why is there no attempt at reform, no compassion for the locked-up? And what about practical steps like building better, more humane prisons?

Only private do-gooders, religious members, some educational institutions who concern themselves with prisoners mitigate the conditions but only in penitentiaries. And as outsiders, they cannot quite reach everyone or do enough. City and town jails are usually overlooked because of the idea that prisoners are there temporarily which is far from true. Many stay for years, even decades without being tried.

In the last administration there was a public/private project to build a large, modern (presumably humane) prison facility in Nueva Ecija. It was about to be bid out, but for whatever reason the project fell through. This administration seems to have put it on hold, which perpetuates, if not worsens, the already dreadful prison conditions. In the Build Build Build world, is there no room for a humanitarian priority like new facilities for prisoners?

Aside from better physical facilities, there is a need for more professional rehabilitation procedures like education, livelihood activities, psychological help, spiritual guidance and a general acceptance that prisoners are human beings that can be rehabilitated. Only private parties seem to be aware of these needs. Government policy seems to be indifferent.

Unfortunately, our prison officials are not trained custodians but retired personnel from other careers, mostly military, thrust into being prison managers. They see their positions as temporary, tolerate the onerous conditions in jails, are passive to the need for reform or make an overall judgment that criminals do not deserve compassion or assistance.

Considering our slow and inefficient justice system, the inequality in our society, and the poor quality of police crime investigation work, as well the latest draconian treatment of loiterers and street habitués who are willy-nilly incarcerated, injustice is rampant. A good number of prisoners who are convicted are fall guys, convicted of crimes that they were not masterminds of but were paid accomplices or maybe even innocent bystanders. Drug addicts in jail are mostly poverty-stricken users, not the big-time drug lords. And if there are big-time drug lords, check out the kubos, the amenities and luxuries that they somehow continue to enjoy while incarcerated. They are so much more important than others that their testimonies are given worth.

The above presents a slew of social problems in the justice system of our society. How to solve them will be a herculean task of delivering equal justice for all. One little first step, perhaps seemingly inconsequential, would be to have a more humane incarceration of our fellow human beings, in equality and justice, and with concern and compassion.

This story was originally published by The Manila Times, Philippines

The post Our prisons are hellholes appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Bamboo is stronger than concrete or steel but is a renewable resource, providing refuge and food for wildlife as well as biomass. Credit: CC by 2.0

By Ed Holt
VIENNA, Jun 29 2018 (IPS)

A landmark conference bringing more than 1,200 people from across the world together to promote and explain the importance of bamboo and rattan to global sustainable development and tackling climate change has ended with a raft of agreements and project launches.

The three-day Global Bamboo and Rattan Congress in Beijing this week, organised by multilateral development group the International Bamboo and Rattan Organisation (INBAR) and China’s National Forestry and Grassland Administration (NFGA), was the first international, policy-focused conference on the use of bamboo and rattan to help sustainable development.“Bamboo is not a climate change silver bullet, but we want people to realise that it is a ‘forgotten opportunity’ in helping mitigate the effects of climate change." --INBAR Director General Dr Hans Friedrich

Organisers had pledged to ensure that the event would not be “simply a talking shop”, instead making real progress on raising awareness of the potential role of bamboo and rattan in helping solve major global problems.

As it closed, it appeared that goal had been met with the announcement of a number of agreements, including a major project to develop bamboo sectors across Africa and an agreement between INBAR members to further develop bamboo and rattan sectors in other parts of the world.

Speaking at the end of the conference, INBAR Director General Dr Hans Friedrich said: “We have made some real steps forward for the development of bamboo and rattan.”

Bamboo and rattan have long been championed by environmental organisations and groups promoting sustainable development, especially in the world’s poorest countries.

A grass, bamboo is a native plant on all continents except Antarctica and Europe, although the majority of its natural habitat is in the tropical belts.

It is stronger than concrete or steel but is a renewable resource, providing refuge and food for wildlife as well as biomass. It captures higher amounts of CO2 than most other plants and can be harvested significantly faster than wood – over a period of 20 years it can produce almost 12 times as much material as wood.

It can be used for shelter as well as, in some cases, transport, and provides sustainable, ecologically-friendly economic and commercial opportunities to people, especially in poorer communities.

Groups like INBAR point out that bamboo use can play a significant part in helping countries meet many of the UN’s sustainable development goals.

But awareness of the potential of bamboo and rattan is generally low in many countries, especially in the more developed world and particularly at senior levels of government and industry.

Dr Friedrich told IPS: “A large part of the reason for this conference is about awareness. We want to tell people who don’t yet realise it that bamboo and rattan can help them reach their sustainable development goals.

“The potential is immense. It is understood by people in, for example, the forestry industry, and others, but not really by politicians. At this conference we want to help them realise this by giving them examples.”

Bringing together ministers, industry leaders, scientists and entrepreneurs, the conference used examples of innovative bamboo use – from a thirty-foot bamboo wind turbine blade to bamboo diapers – and real-life stories from individuals of bamboo and rattan helping create sustainable livelihoods to underline to decision-makers and senior industry figures the potential.

One of the key aims of the meeting, said organisers, was to try and push those decision-makers into setting up the institutional, regulatory, policy, and business frameworks necessary to kick-start a new sustainable development paradigm.

“In the last few years I have met a number of ministers and they always start off being sceptical about bamboo but after they see everything they realise its potential.

“We want governments to think about bamboo when they think about their plans for climate change, sustainable development and green policies,” Dr Friedrich told IPS.

INBAR also used the conference to talk to representatives from large private sector firms about how to build global value chains, as well as how to set up international standards which support international bamboo and rattan trade.

Its proponents have pointed out the economic potential, particularly in poorer countries, of the bamboo industry. In China, which Dr Friedrich says has until now been the “only country taking bamboo really seriously [as an industry]”, the bamboo industry employs 10 million people and is valued at USD 30 billion per year.

“People are beginning to realise the economic potential and opportunities for bamboo,” Friedrich told IPS.

The conference also highlighted the impact bamboo and rattan could have on climate change.

Speakers from various countries, including politicians, spoke about how bamboo and rattan was being used to help combat the effects of climate change and help the environment.

Experts outlined its potential and current use in areas like forest protection, restoration of degraded land, and carbon capture as well as a replacement for more carbon-intensive materials such as cement and steel in construction and industry.

An INBAR report released ahead of the conference gave an analysis of the carbon which is saved by substituting more emissions-intensive products for bamboo. It found the carbon emissions reduction potential of a managed giant bamboo species forest is potentially significantly higher than for certain types of trees under the same conditions.

Combining bamboo’s potential displacement factor with bamboo’s carbon storage rate, bamboo can sequester enormous sums of CO2 – from 200 to almost 400 tonnes of carbon per hectare. In China alone, the plant is projected to store more than one million tons of carbon by 2050.

Bamboo can also be used in durable products, including furniture, flooring, housing and pipes, replacing emissions-intensive materials including timber, plastics, cement and metals.
It can also be used as a substitute for fossil fuel-based energy sources – research by INBAR has shown that substituting electricity from the Chinese grid with electricity from bamboo gasification would reduce CO2 emissions by almost 7 tonnes of CO2 per year.

Bamboo can also help communities adapt to the effects of climate change, serving as a strong but flexible building material for shelter, as well as helping restore degraded land and combat desertification.

Patricia Espinosa, the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said at the conference: “In short, bamboo and rattan represent an important part of reducing net emissions. And this is exactly what the world needs right now.”

Speaking to IPS on the eve of the conference, Dr Friedrich said he hoped that policymakers would realise the potential for bamboo as part of solutions for dealing with climate change.

“Bamboo is not a climate change silver bullet, but we want people to realise that it is a ‘forgotten opportunity’ in helping mitigate the effects of climate change,” he said.

INBAR officials readily admit that it is likely to take time to raise awareness of the potential of bamboo and rattan, but they are encouraged by the fact that more countries are starting to look at it seriously as an industry, including in Africa and South America.

But Dr Friedrich was keen to stress that the conference was just a beginning and that, with international agreements on important projects being signed, he was hopeful of real change in the future use and awareness of the potential of bamboo and rattan.

“I hope this conference is going to be a landmark moment. I want it to be the catalyst and inspiration for real change,” he told IPS.

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The post Bamboo, A Sustainability Powerhouse appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Carmen Arroyo and Emily Thampoe
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 29 2018 (IPS)

The World Drug Report 2018, launched this week by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), highlighted the importance of gender in drug consumption and behaviour, suggesting it is essential to provide different types of health-care and legal solutions.

Only one in five women addicts seeks treatment for drug abuse, the president of the International Narcotics Board (INCB) has warned. Credit: UN Photo/D. Gair

As Marie Nougier, Head of Research and Communications at the International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC) told IPS: “There is certainly no one-size-fits-all strategy towards drug use – there should be a range of evidence-based prevention, harm reduction, treatment and other health and social support services that are able to respond to the many problems women may face when using drugs”.

About 5.6% of the global population between 15 and 64 years old -275 million people- used drugs during 2016, according to the report. From those, 31 million suffer from drug disorders, which means that they need treatment.

However, drug treatments are only reaching one sixth of drug consumers. The consequences are terrible, with 450,000 people dying in 2015 due to drug consumption. What’s more, global opium production increased by 65% from 2016 to 2017, which is the highest estimate so far.

The report has been separated into five sections, the fifth being about the effect that gender has on drug usage, especially in terms of women. The others include information such as an executive summary, drug demand and supply, drug markets, and drugs and age.

The fifth report states that while women consume opioids and tranquilizers more often than men, they use more cannabis and cocaine. Despite women starting to consume substances later in life than men, they increase their intake of related drugs -alcohol, opioids and cocaine- faster than them.

Whereas women mostly associate drug consumption with an intimate partner, men tend to consume substances with other male friends. And while women tend to suffer more from depression, anxiety, or other mental health conditions, men suffer from externalized problems like conduct disorder, such as “attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and antisocial personality disorder”.

These are some of the gender-based differences in drug consumption that the report points out, but what stands out most in terms of finding long-term solutions is that women “may also have experienced childhood adversity such as physical neglect, abuse or sexual abuse”.

When this is coupled with strong drug policies, the result is a higher proportion of women sentenced for drug-related offences. Women are also shown to be more affected by post traumatic stress disorder.

Nougier from IDPC told IPS: “Drug policies focusing on punishing people for drug use have greatly contributed to drug-related health issues, including the spread of HIV and hepatitis C and overdose deaths, as the fear of arrest and punishment deters people from accessing the harm reduction and treatment services they may need”.

She added: “Punitive approaches have also increased the levels of stigma and discrimination against people who use drugs”.

Additionally, according Nougier, punitive approaches tend to affect women more, as there are no treatment programs that include a gender approach. Their needs -due to their background and consumption behavior- are different.

Also “because of the gender inequalities that continue to prevail in our societies, with women facing significant stigma for breaking with the role of the ‘good woman’ or the ‘good mother’ for using drugs. In some countries, using drugs during pregnancy is a criminal offence, which acts as a serious barrier for women to seek prenatal healthcare support or drug services”.

Kamran Niaz, epidemiologist at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, told IPS that “women have better long-term outcomes when they receive treatments that focus on the issues more commonly found in women with drug use disorders compared to treatments that lack such a women-centred focus”.

Gender specific treatments

Asked about gender-specific treatments, Niaz added: “Prevention of drug use among girls/women requires investing in family-based prevention addressing vulnerabilities that appear to be unique to girls”. He continued: “in order to address the issues of drug use disorders among women, treatment services and programmes should be tailored to the needs of women and pregnant women”.

Some of the programmes that Niaz found specific for girls included: “dealing with stress, depression, social assertiveness, body image and improving relations and communication with parents and other significant others”.

Pamela Kent, Associate Director of Research at the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA), told IPS: “A more informed and empathetic approach to women’s substance use is required—one that also considers various aspects such as reproductive health, perinatal service and child welfare. It’s important to note that not a one-size fits all—society needs to provide women-centered prevention and treatment resources and responses”.

Regarding the relation between drug use and abuse, Niaz said: “As women with drug use disorders are more vulnerable to domestic violence and sexual abuse, and their children may also be at risk of abuse, a liaison with social agencies protecting women and children is helpful”.

He added: “In addition in the case of child abuse we need programmes to prevent such abuse and, particularly, to support the victims and to address post-traumatic stress disorders among them”.

Kent agreed that abuse is a primary concern: “[The 2017 Life in Recovery from Addiction in Canada survey] showed that females reported greater family violence and untreated mental health concerns during addiction compared to males. In additional, for informal support, females more likely to use technology, connect with an animal, or use art, poetry, writing and yoga compared to males”.

However, not many programs have been implemented that include this gender-based approach. The report adds that the criminal justice system is designed for male offenders and thus forgets any nuances that relate to women.

Nougier said: “We continue to see a concerning lack of access to treatment by women dependent on drugs, both in the community and in prison. Available services are generally designed by and for men, and are often unable to tailor to the specific needs faced by women. In closed settings, most harm reduction and treatment services are only available in male prisons”.

Some facilities are starting to adapt themselves to these proven needs, according to Nougier. “Dome harm reduction and treatment facilities have adapted their services to better engage with women with specific opening hours for women only, a space for children while women come to the centre, and the provision gender-specific services (e.g. legal aid or support to respond to domestic violence, sexual and reproductive health support, etc.)”, she said.

Niaz agreed that “the programmes need to manage the myriad of issues such patients face, and should encompass broader health, learning, and social welfare context in collaboration with family, schools and social services”.

The post Fight Against Drug Consumption Needs Gender Specific Treatments appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Geneva Centre
GENEVA, Jun 29 2018 (Geneva Centre)

On 25 June 2018, the Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement and Global Dialogue organized a World Conference on the theme of “Religions, Creeds and Value Systems: Joining Forces to Enhance Equal Citizenship Rights” at the United Nations Office at Geneva in collaboration with the International Catholic Migration Commission, the World Council of Churches, the Arab Thought Forum, the World Council of Religious Leaders, Bridges to Common Ground and the European Centre for Peace and Development.

The World Conference – held under the patronage of His Royal Highness Prince El Hassan bin Talal of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan – was addressed by more than 35 world-renowned religious, political and lay leaders from the major regions of the world.

Dr Farhan Nizami, Director of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, discussed in his statement some of the underlying ideas behind religious beliefs and citizenship, highlighting the disconnects between religious sentiments and the expectations of mundane citizenship.

He emphasized the issue of belonging in relation to equality of citizenship rights, pointing out the importance of belonging based on belief, rather than belonging taking over belief.

In this regard, he remarked that “What is however a problem is belonging, because sometimes belief can lead to rather divisive belonging, whereas when belonging is based on belief it can be sustainable, durable and withstand challenges. But sometimes when belonging takes over belief it can be divisive and tribal. I would suggest that some of these nationalist, chauvinistic and xenophobic trends we see are sometimes belonging taking over belief.”

Dr Nizami also added that believers, regardless of their religion, were required to demonstrate that their beliefs were “adaptable to universal rights.” However, there exists a wide gap between the political ideal of equality and the religious ideal of equality of God.

“Within religions, the emphasis is not so much on rights but on obligations. In this religious perspective, rights emerge from people learning to live their obligations to their human and natural environments,” the Director of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies said in his statement.

About the Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement and Global Dialogue

The Geneva Centre for Human Rights Advancement and Global Dialogue, an organization with special consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council, is a think tank dedicated to the promotion of human rights through cross-cultural, religious and civilizational dialogue between the Global North and Global South, and through training of the upcoming generations of stakeholders in the Arab region. Its aim is to act as a platform for dialogue between a variety of stakeholders involved in the promotion and protection of human rights.

CONTACTS MEDIA:
Blerim Mustafa
Junior project and communications officer
Email: bmustafa@gchragd.org
Phone number: +41 (0) 22 748 27 95

Teodora Popa
Project officer
Email: tpopa@gchragd.org
Phone number: +41 (0) 22 748 27 86

The post Director of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies: “Let us be wary of the abuse of human rights to legitimize the attainment of political and other objectives through coercion” appeared first on Inter Press Service.