Thursday, April 29, 2010

WHO-- Haitians delivering healthcare to Haitians


Haitians Delivering Healthcare to Haitians, WHO, April 2010 A critical component of the response to the earthquake in Haiti, including its health consequences, has been the Haitian people themselves. The following story describes different types of services that have been set up by and for the Haitian people. Mobile clinics and temporary clinics have been opened. Despite a lack of resources and medical supplies these clinics are handling a wide range of health conditions, from tending to physical wounds and providing rehabilitation to treating chronic, pre-existing conditions. More...

TransAfrica Forum--Dorothy Height: An Enduring Spirit for Justice


Dorothy Height: An Enduring Spirit for Justice Washington, DC April 20, 2010--TransAfrica Forum would like to extend its sincere condolences to the family and friends of Dr. Dorothy Irene Height, who passed away today at the age of 98. Often referred to as the Mother of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, Dr. Height’s work for equality for all races and genders went beyond the shores of this country. More...

Africans Extend Solidarity to Haiti


Africans Extend Solidarity to Haiti: Money, Food and Medicines from “Mother Africa” to Her Diaspora, by Ernest Harsch, Africa Renewal (UN Publication), April 2010, pg. 22 In the broad international mobilization to help the stricken people of Haiti, Africa is not lagging behind. Government officials, religious leaders, students, artists and many other Africans responded to the news of the devastating earthquake of 12 January with an immediate outpouring of support and solidarity. By end-March, some 24 countries in Africa had either donated or pledged more than $51 mn for Haitian relief efforts, according to available reports. That was just a tiny fraction of the total of $3.5 bn given or promised worldwide, but notable nonetheless for the continent with the world’s highest poverty rates. More...

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Children Reach Out Through the Screen to Peers in Post-Quake Haiti

Children Reach Out Through the Screen to Peers in Post-Quake Haiti, by Dalia Acosta, Inter Press Service News Agency, April 26, 2010 Five girls and five boys are taking time to remember the hurricane that devastated their home town of Gibara in eastern Cuba two years ago, mingling their memories with their dreams, and filming images to make a video message for children in Haiti. "What I like best is learning through playing," said one of the primary school children selected to take part in an audiovisual production workshop in Gibara. More...

Rebuilding Haiti - Mission impossible?


Rebuilding Haiti - Mission impossible?, BBC News "World Have Your Say", April 27, 2010 Mark has just sent this post to me: There's nothing like a 2 hour delay on a runway during a storm for you to bond with your fellow passengers. We were on our way to Haiti from Miami but - not for the first time - mother nature was having a say. As the thunder and lightning raged around us, I got chatting to the women either side of me. Both Haiti "veterans" and both on their way there to try to help out. More...

Friday, April 23, 2010

US military operation in Haiti draws to close

US military operation in Haiti draws to close, by Anne Flaherty, The Washington Post, April 19, 2010
WASHINGTON -- The U.S. military mobilization in support of Haitian earthquake relief and recovery efforts is winding down and will be concluded for the most part by June 1.
U.S. Southern Command chief Lt. Gen. Ken Keen says there are about 2,200 American troops still there, compared to 22,000 at the peak of the U.S. effort. And he says that by June, only about 500 National Guard and Reserve personnel will be stationed in Haiti to help aid workers. More...

Gang violence increases as angry Haitians see quake aid benefiting the wealthy elite

Gang violence increases as angry Haitians see quake aid benefiting the wealthy elite, by Peter Beaumont, The Guardian, April 18, 2010
Groups who once supported the president of Haiti, René Préval, are arming themselves against the government, putting the earthquake-ravaged country in danger of renewed instability and political violence. Threats from individuals closely linked to a number of leading gangs who once enjoyed the patronage of former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide come amid growing private concern among diplomats and aid workers over Haiti's increasingly dangerous trajectory. More...

UN launches website tracking aid use in Haiti

UN launches website tracking aid use in Haiti, Telegraph.co.uk, April 22, 2010
The United Nations has launched a new website to track the estimated $9.9 billion in aid pledged to Haiti by the international community in the wake of a devastating January 12 earthquake.The site, a joint project between the UN Development Programme and the Haitian government, will promote efficient spending while "ensuring transparency and accountability of the use of their funds," a UN statement said. More...

Haiti's earthquake death toll revised to at least 250,000

Haiti's earthquake death toll revised to at least 250,000, Telegraph.co.uk, April 22, 2010
Haiti's devastating January earthquake killed between 250,000 and 300,000 people, the head of the United Nations mission in the country has said, at least 30,000 more than previously thought. More...

Haitian-Dominican Relations Warming After Quake

Haitian-Dominican Relations Warming After Quake, by Garry Pierre-Pierre, Inter Press Service News Agency, April 20, 2010 Angela Solis de Pena remembered the story that her parents told her of a Haitian man who tried to rape a Dominican woman; after the woman escaped the man chased her and hacked her to death."I was petrified of Haitians," Solis de Pena said. "It made me think of them differently for a long time." Now a 34-year-old administrator of a preschool here in Santiago, Solis de Pena said she doesn't know whether the story was true or not. What she does know is that it made her fear and loathe Haitians, and it was not until she went to college and began reading the Bible and interacting with Haitian students that she realised that perhaps that tale was stretched a bit. More...

Field Notes from MEDICC

Field Notes from MEDICC, Interview with Dr. Patrick Dely: Part II, by Conner Gorry, April 20, 2010 “My future is to see my country transformed, a different country, where Haitians feel happy and proud to be in their country. Where they don’t need to emigrate, where Haitian children have access to education… I see myself working to make this Haiti a reality. My future is to work towards change.”

Dr Patrick Dely spent his early childhood in St Michel L´Attalaye, a town in the central department of Artibonite where the environment was nearly exhausted and educational opportunities limited (to say the least). He attended Haitian public schools – where up to 150 students crowd into a classroom, oftentimes without a teacher – and always dreamed of becoming a doctor. But until a friend alerted him to the possibility of a scholarship to study medicine in Cuba, his future practicing medicine remained just that: a dream. Over ten years later, Dr Dely is a family doctor who was a few weeks short of obtaining his second specialty in epidemiology in Cuba when his country was devastated by the January earthquake. In Part II of this interview, Dr Dely talks with me in Port-au-Prince about difficulties facing the Haitian public health system, what challenges that system presents to Haitian doctors trained in Cuba, and his future plans for his hometown and beyond. To learn more about this remarkable young man, see Part I of this interview. More...

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Forced IDP Relocations

Forced IDP Relocations, April 12, 2010: TransAfrica Forum works closely with the Haiti Response Coalition, a network of Haitian rural and urban civil society organizations. Prior to the January 12, 2010 earthquake many coalition members were engaged in a variety of community-based development activities throughout the country. Since the earthquake, groups have used their previously established relationships with community and neighborhood groups to assist with camp construction for internally displaced people (IDPs), relief distribution, and needs assessment production. More...

Disorganised Diaspora on Fringe of Post-Quake Decisions

Disorganised Diaspora on Fringe of Post-Quake Decisions, by Carla Murphy, Inter Press Service News Agency, April 12, 2010 For years, Haitians living overseas have been the lifeline of the troubled country, sending billions of dollars to relatives back home. But now, as the international community debates and pledges aid in the aftermath of the earthquake, many Haitians in the United States are feeling left out of the decision-making process. Nowhere was this more evident than last week as delegates from more than 140 countries convened at the United Nations for a conference to raise money for the reconstruction of Haiti. At the end of the day, roughly 9.9 billion dollars had been pledged over 10 years. Of that amount 5.26, billion is for the first 18 months, according to U.N. officials. More...

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Thomas Mapfumo @ the Zimbabwe Solidarity Concert!






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About Thomas Mapfumo

Thomas Mapfumo is a legendary Zimbabwean musician. He is revered as the "Lion of Zimbabwe", and tours around the world. Mapfumo is responsible for blending traditional Shona mbira music with modern instruments, contemporary politics and traditional proverbs to create the Chimurenga ( people's struggle) music style.


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NYT:Leg Lost, Dancer Is Caught Between Caregivers

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Fabienne Jean, a professional dancer who lost her right leg in the earthquake, hopped on her slim left leg through the dusty General Hospital compound on her way to a very important X-ray. More..

Monday, April 12, 2010

Haiti Criticized Over Forced Stadium Eviction

Haiti Criticized Over Forced Stadium Eviction
AFP News April 12, 2010

PORT-AU-PRINCE - The aid group Action Against Hunger on Sunday slammed Haiti's forced evictions of hundreds of homeless quake victims from the pitch of the country's national stadium.

"We are shocked at the way it has happened. There is no planning. There is no solution offered to the people who lived in the stadium," unlike people evacuated from other camps, said Lucille Grosjean, spokeswoman for the
France-based organization.

Beginning late Friday, contingents of the Haitian National Police began breaking down tents and other shelters in the Sylvio Cator stadium, almost three months after the January 12 quake killed more than 220,000 people and
left 1.3 million homeless.

Evacuations of tent cities across Port-au-Prince were meanwhile being ramped up ahead of the rainy season, including the first few hundred from the overcrowded camp at the Petionville golf club, which is prone to mudslides and flooding, to a new location 20 kilometers (12 miles) away.

About 7,335 people, including some 1,300 families, had sought shelter on national stadium's artificial turf since it was opened up to victims after the disaster, but unlike other camps were not being moved by authorities to other
locales.

"Displaced Fear Expulsion from Makeshift Camps"

"Displaced Fear Expulsion from Makeshift Camps"
By Ansel Herz
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Apr 8, 2010 (IPS) - For decades, the Saint Louis de Gonzague school has groomed some of Haiti's most elite political players. Francois Duvalier, the iron-fisted dictator who ruled Haiti for 14 years, sent his son to the school. About 1,500 children of Haiti's wealthiest class attend each year.

Within days of the January earthquake, the sparse concrete grounds of the Gonazague secondary school became home to nearly 11,000 Haitian families, driven out of destroyed neighbourhoods in central Port-Au-Prince.

Now the school's director wants to reopen the school. The government encouraged schools to resume classes on Monday, calling it another small step towards normalcy...

Friday, April 9, 2010

HAITI: Rebuilding Waits on Promised Aid

HAITI: Rebuilding Waits on Promised Aid, by Armin Rosen, Inter Press Service News Agency, April 7, 2010 A week ago, 59 U.N. member states, international institutions and NGO coalitions pledged nearly 10 billion dollars towards rebuilding Haiti over the next decade. But the self-congratulation ended with the conference's upbeat closing press conference, as NGOs and activists are now questioning both the reconstruction plan and the likelihood that nations will follow through on their financial commitments. More...

Haiti's rainy reason could mean suffering is in the forecast

Haiti's rainy reason could mean suffering is in the forecast, by Manuel Roig-Franzia, The Washington Post, April 4, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI -- Mud invades every inch of the saggy handmade tent Mimose Pierre-Louis now calls home. It spatters the pink bedsheet that serves as her wall, crawls up the acacia branch that plays the role of wobbly tent pole and forms the floor she lies on. More...

Haiti struggles to reopen its schools after quake

Haiti struggles to reopen its schools after quake, By Claudia Gaillard, The Washington Post, April 5, 2010
PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) - Some schools reopened in the wrecked Haitian capital on Monday nearly three months after the January 12 earthquake, but others could not because of lack of repairs or equipment, staff said. The education ministry, backed by the United Nations children's agency UNICEF, had called for classes to resume 12 weeks after the quake which reduced many parts of the city to rubble and destroyed or damaged more than 4,000 schools. The education ministry itself was also destroyed. More...

Small-business owners feel left out of Haiti’s rebuilding plan

Small-business owners feel left out of Haiti’s rebuilding plan, by Jessica Leeder, The Globe and Mail, April 08, 2010
The narrow consumer market here for dried flower arrangements, greeting cards, wrapping paper and electrified fish bowls that double as children’s bedside lamps disappeared on the afternoon of January 12. That wasn’t an initial concern, however, for Molver Desire, the owner of Nini’s Fleurs and Baby Gifts, a quaint, one-storey shop on the outer fringe of Jacmel’s heritage district. After the 7.3-magnitude earthquake, the shop with its half-caved roof and grit-coated inventory was in no shape for receiving customers. More..

Many of Haiti's most-wanted on the loose after earthquake

Many of Haiti's most-wanted on the loose after earthquake, by Manuel Roig-Franzia, The Washington Post, April 09, 2010
...On that afternoon, while tens of thousands of Haitians were being crushed to death, Wilson and more than 4,500 other inmates slipped out of a wing of the National Penitentiary, known as the "Titanic." Since then, Haitian and international police say, the most notorious of the escapees have terrorized neighborhoods, stolen aid supplies and fought ever more pitched battles among themselves that threaten the stability of a fragile society still far from recovering from one of the country's worst disasters in recent memory. More...

The Camp That Vanished and the Priest Who Forced Them Out

The Camp That Vanished and the Priest Who Forced Them Out, Interpress Service (posted on Mediahacker.org), March 09, 2010
Perched near the top of a steep hill, the fractured pink walls of Villa Manrese overlook the rest of the capital city. Both ends of the three-story compound have collapsed, spilling into mounds of rubble. The first floor was pulverised into a layer of dust. There are still bodies inside. But in the adjacent garden behind the Catholic retreat, also known as Centre Saint-Viateur, life sprang anew after the Jan. 12 earthquake struck Haiti. More...

Displaced Fear Expulsion from Makeshift Camps

Displaced Fear Expulsion from Makeshift Camps, by Ansel Herz, Inter Press Service, April 8, 2010
Within days of the January earthquake, the sparse concrete grounds of the Gonazague secondary school became home to nearly 11,000 Haitian families, driven out of destroyed neighbourhoods in central Port-Au-Prince. Now the school's director wants to reopen the school. The government encouraged schools to resume classes on Monday, calling it another small step towards normalcy. The potential reopening of the school has inspired anything but calm among internally displaced people at Saint Louis de Gonzague. They have been threatened with expulsion by force. "Everyone is nervous right now. If they force us to leave it will be second catastrophe," said Elivre Constant, smoking a cigarette in the middle of the crowded camp. "A lot of people here don't have anywhere to go. They have kids. They won't be safe." More...

Our bodies are shaking now

Our bodies are shaking now, by Beverly Bell, Pambazuka News, April 1, 2010.
Haiti’s earthquake has left women and children in the country highly vulnerable to rape and violence.‘The way you saw the earth shake, that’s how our bodies are shaking now,’ said a member of the grassroots anti-violence group, Commission of Women Victim-to-Victim (KOFAVIV by its Creole acronym). She was speaking at a meeting about violence against women and children since the earthquake on 12 January. The venue of the meeting was KOFAVIV’s new headquarters: A tarp in a displaced persons camp in Port-au-Prince. All the women of KOFAVIV lost their homes in the disaster, while more than 300 lost their lives. More...

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Cuban Medical Aid to Haiti

Cuban Medical Aid to Haiti, Emily J. Kirk and John M. Kirk, Counterpunch, 1 April 2010 Media coverage of Cuban medical cooperation following the disastrous recent earthquake in Haiti was sparse indeed. International news reports usually described the Dominican Republic as being the first to provide assistance, while Fox News sang the praises of U.S. relief efforts in a report entitled "U.S. Spearheads Global Response to Haiti Earthquake"-a common theme of its extensive coverage. CNN also broadcast hundreds of reports, and in fact one focused on a Cuban doctor wearing a T-shirt with a large image of Che Guevara--and yet described him as a "Spanish doctor". More...

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Haiti’s Declaration of Independence Found

Haiti’s Declaration of Independence Found, PRI's The World, April 1, 2010 Anchor Marco Werman speaks with Julia Gaffield, a Duke graduate student who found a rare original copy of Haiti’s declaration of independence in Britain’s National Archive. More...

"Recovery from Natural Catastrophes, Wars and the Financial Crisis"

15th Annual Women Ambassadors Conference. Topic: "Recovery from Natural Catastrophes, Wars and the Financial Crisis"

Date: Thursday April 8, 2010

Time: 10:00am-12:00pm,
Place: Howard University School of Business Auditorium

Time: 2:30pm-6:00pm,
Place: US Congress - Rayburn Building Room 2325


2:30 - 3:30 pm Recovery from the Financial Crisis
3:30 - 4:30 pm Recovery from Wars, the case of Congo (DRC)
4:30 - 5:30 pm Haiti: Recovery from Natural Catastrophes
5:30 - 6:00 pm Recommendations on Haiti ’s Recovery
For further information call organizers, Dr. Marilyn Sephocle at (202) 247 7404 or at (202) 806 6758;
or Ms. Trisha Raines, Office of Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson at (202) 225-8885.

Haiti's Resurrection: Promoting Human Rights by Mark Schuller

Haiti's Resurrection: Promoting Human Rights by Mark Schuller

Mark Schuller reports from Port-au-Prince about the current state of housing and shelter, food, water and healthcare distribution. With coming rains, and consitently ignored Haitian leadership, Schuller makes recommendations on how to move forward.

Monday, April 5, 2010

Matthew 25 House and Sister Mary Finnick on The Today Show

Matthew 25 House and Sister Mary Finnick on The Today Show

Matthew 25 Guesthouse in Port-au-Prince's Delmas 33 neighborhood has become the home to hundreds of families since the Earthquake on January 12th. The Today Show met with community members as well as Sister Mary Finnick to follow-up on the still urgent needs.

Saturday, April 3, 2010

HAITI: Women Demand Role in Reconstruction

HAITI: Women Demand Role in Reconstruction, IRIN, April 1, 2010 Women's civil society groups were noticeable by their absence from the landmark Haiti donor conference on 31 March, which secured pledges of US$5.3 billion over the next two years to support the country’s post-quake recovery. Their lack of a presence at the meeting was indicative of a broader missing voice in Haiti’s long-term reconstruction prospects, gender activists argued. “Why are we not there right now, where are the women at this conference?” questioned Marie St. Cyr, a Haitian human rights advocate. “We still don’t have full participation and we certainly don’t have full inclusion. Haitian women are still being raped…they are supporting more than half of the households, and yet they are not being heard.” More....

The Upcoming Donors' Conference for Haiti

The Upcoming Donors' Conference for Haiti, Tectonic Shifts? by Mark Schuller, Counterpunch, March 26-28, 2010 This week former Presidents Clinton and Bush are in Haiti, trying to drum up support for Haiti’s reconstruction and setting the stage for the upcoming donor conference at the U.N. on March 31. There is no shortage of needs, and even plans to address them. Yet the process has as yet to be transparent. More...

Trauma and Solidarity in the New Haiti

Trauma and Solidarity in the New Haiti, by Mark Schuller, NACLA Report on the Americas, March/April 2010 I arrived in Christ-Roi, a mixed-income neighborhood in Port-au-Prince, on January 20 as part of a 13-person medical team organized by and for a local clinic, Hospice St. Joseph. Eight days had passed since the devastating earthquake. We arrived on one of the first civilian aid flights that the U.S. military, having seized the airport three days after the quake, allowed into the country.

The military’s emphasis on using the airport to deploy troops to organize logistics—at the expense of delivering humanitarian aid, at least in the early days of the crisis—caused serious delays in providing desperately needed help. But the airport was not the only source of delays. The land route for delivering aid was closed off when the occupying United Nations forces closed the border with the Dominican Republic to prevent a flood of refugees. The only other viable option was by sea, but the earthquake destroyed the capital’s port, where most of the country’s goods arrive. Making matters worse, the quake damaged already bad roads connecting functioning ports in Saint-Marc and Cap-Haïtien. More...

Friday, April 2, 2010

/CORRECTION*/HAITI: Donors Pledge 10 Billion Dollars in Aid

/CORRECTION*/HAITI: Donors Pledge 10 Billion Dollars in Aid, by Armin Rosen Eleven weeks after an earthquake killed over two percent of its population and flattened its capital city, Haiti is looking towards a long and complex rebuilding process.

On Wednesday, 59 U.N. member states, international institutions and NGO coalitions pledged over five billion dollars towards the nation's near-term reconstruction, with almost 10 billion dollars towards reconstruction costs over the next decade. Donors shattered the pre-conference goal of 3.9 billion dollars for the next 18 months.

"By their actions this day, the friends of Haiti have acted far beyond expectations," said U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon. "We can report very good news."

The funds will establish an interim redevelopment commission that will help the country transition from its current humanitarian emergency to a long-term rebuilding process. More...

HAITI: Looking More and More Like a War Zone

HAITI: Looking More and More Like a War Zone, by Ansel Herz, Inter Press Service News Service, March 30, 2010 On an empty road in Cite Militaire, an industrial zone across from the slums of Cite Soleil, a group of women are gathered around a single white sack of U.S. rice. The rice was handed out Monday morning at a food distribution by the Christian relief group World Vision.

According to witnesses, during the distribution U.N. peacekeeping troops sprayed tear gas on the crowd.

"Haitians know that's the way they act with us. They treat us like animals," said Lourette Elris, as she divided the rice amongst the women. "They gave us the food, we were on our way home, then the troops threw tear gas at us. We finished receiving the food, we weren't disorderly. " More...

Haiti Prompts Meeting of top Cuban

Haiti Prompts Meeting of Top Cuban, U.S. Officials, by Paul Haven, The Miami Herald, April 1, 2010 Cuba's foreign minister met with a top U.S. State Department official to coordinate medical help for quake-ravaged Haiti, one of the highest level encounters in years between the Cold War enemies, officials said Thursday. More...

Rushed From Haiti, Then Jailed for Lacking Visas

Rushed From Haiti, Then Jailed for Lacking Visas, by Nina Bernstein, The New York Times, March 31, 2010 More than two months after the earthquake that devastated Haiti, at least 30 survivors who were waved onto planes by Marines in the chaotic aftermath are prisoners of the United States immigration system, locked up since their arrival in detention centers in Florida. In Haiti, some were pulled from the rubble, their legal advocates say. Some lost parents, siblings or children. Many were seeking food, safety or medical care at the Port-au-Prince airport when terrifying aftershocks prompted hasty evacuations by military transports, with no time for immigration processing. None have criminal histories. More...

Skepticism on Pledges for Haiti

Skepticism on Pledges for Haiti, The New York Times, by Neil MacFarquhar, April 1, 2010
UNITED NATIONS — An international effort to finance the reconstruction of Haiti attracted billions of dollars in pledges at a conference here on Wednesday, but the very size of the outpouring raised questions about whether the commitments would be met and how fast the financial support could help salve the needs of the Haitian people. More...

Thursday, April 1, 2010

We Can Do Better for Haiti

We Can Do Better for Haiti: Demand Transparency and Improved Aid Distribution Institute for Justice And Democracy in Haiti, The world responded generously to Haiti's earthquake, immediately donating over $2.5 billion, with another $1.2 billion pledged, even before the March 31 UN Donor's Conference. This works out to over $1,000 per earthquake victim. But over two months later, hundreds of thousands of Haiti's earthquake victims live without waterproof shelter, eat once a day or less, and do not receive adequate medical care. More...

International Donors' Conference Towards a New Future for Haiti

International Donors' Conference Towards a New Future for Haiti More... http://www.haiticonference.org/