Mr. Griffiths was addressing the International Donor Conference for Ukraine in Warsaw. Co-hosted by Poland and Sweden, in cooperation with the Presidents of the European Commission and the European Council.
The conference raised a reported $6.5 billion.
According to the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, more than 5.7 million people have now fled across Ukraine’s borders seeking shelter, in the two and a half months since the Russian invasion on 24 February.
In a tweet, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, said that in his briefing to the conference, he had stressed priorities for the millions of refugees and internally diplaced, the importance of cash programmes, shelter and accommodation, and protection of the vulnerable.
He also made clear that planning needs to begin now, for their eventual return home, and solutions to make that a reality.
Cash injection
World Food Programme (WFP) chief David Beasley, also addressed the conference, following the announcement yesterday by the UN emergency food relief agency that it had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Ministry of Social Policy of Ukraine, to scale up cash transfers to half a million people across Ukraine.
The agreement with the Government will support people displaced by the war, and expand the assistance already provided to 170,000 people through cash assistance.
“This partnership will expand our efforts to support the Social Protection system that is already in place in Ukraine,” said Samir Wanmali, WFP Deputy Emergency Coordinator.
Since the beginning of April, WFP has transferred nearly $11 million in local currency, to more than 170,000 people In Vinnytsia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Kharkiv and other cities. Those eligible are receiving between $75 and $225 per month, depending on family size.
Cash allows people to buy the items and services that they consider most important. It is extremely useful to families with a variety of needs in a volatile environment, when they may be moving locations.
Every dollar spent by a family in Ukraine is directly injected into the local economy, said WFP.
Millions traumatized, needing help: UN rights experts
UN independent human rights experts together with the Coordinator of the international non-governmental group known as the Global Protection Cluster, issued a statement on Thursday, highlighting the “appalling” humanitarian situation facing millions in Ukraine
“Multiple forms of gender-based violence are being reported such as sexual exploitation and abuse and sexual violence, including conflict-related sexual violence. Women and girls on the move – at border crossing points or transit and collective centres and in bomb shelters – experience particularly high insecurity and risk of violence, including trafficking in persons”, they said.
“Numerous families have been separated during displacement, and unaccompanied and separated children are particularly vulnerable to the risks of trafficking, violence, abuse and exploitation.”
The also expressed deep concern over the plight of older people and those with disabilities in the war zone.
“Many of them are still in conflict zones because of mobility limitations or reliance on others for care, and face challenges in accessing bomb shelters or safe areas. We are especially concerned about those persons with disabilities, including children, living in institutions for persons with disabilities who face barriers to access humanitarian assistance and evacuation on an equal basis with others.”
Support to save lives
The independent experts called on the international community and donors to provide sustained and increased support for the response to internal displacement and the Ukraine Flash Appeal, and other critical efforts to protect the human rights of all civilians who remain in Ukraine.
“We urge the parties to the conflict to respect international humanitarian law and international human rights law to protect civilians, the statement said.
“We reiterate our call for accountability for the horrific crimes already documented and our support for the initiatives established to investigate these allegations.”
UN Special Rapporteurs are independent experts, appointed by the Human Rights Council. They work on a voluntary basis, are not UN staff, and are not paid for their work.
KYIV, Ukraine, May 05 (IPS) – Before the war, Ukraine’s dream to become part of the EU was exactly that – a dream. But the new political reality could make it come true.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine changed and to some extent even destroyed the familiar international political reality. Up until 24 February, Russia had been integrated into the global economy, had excellent growth prospects, and the construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline was almost finished.
Moreover, NATO had no intention of expanding in any direction and Ukraine joining the EU seemed to be a very long way off given the usual plethora of domestic problems the country was facing.
The Kremlin has chosen a calculated gamble to play to its own advantages, at great cost to many. Russia’s war against Ukraine is a profound crisis capable of dramatically changing how things pan out in the future, making certain developments highly probable which just two months ago seemed utterly implausible.
One such scenario relates to Ukraine’s EU membership. On 28 February in the besieged capital of Kyiv, the fate of which at that point was entirely unclear, President Zelenskyy signed a formal request to accede to the European Union along with a joint declaration with the prime minister and head of the Ukrainian parliament.
At that point, Kyiv had already been clinging on for four days, and the first doubts regarding Russia’s ability to wage a quick and successful campaign were beginning to plunge Europe into a state of strategic uncertainty.
Nickolay KapitonenkoThis was a great symbolic moment for Zelenskyy. For many Ukrainians, it was a light at the end of the tunnel, and for the EU it provided a potential basis for the future restructuring of the entire system of international security. And there is little doubt that the system needs restructuring.
In March 2014, a similar sense of symbolism and hope for the future accompanied the signing of the EU–Ukraine Association Agreement, less than a week after the Crimean status referendum and at the height of the complex and volatile revolutionary events in Kyiv.
This step made a crucial contribution to the consolidation of Ukrainian statehood, to the country’s vision for the future and to its fundamental system of values. Stripped of the hope of rapid accession to the EU – the fact that the Association Agreement never provided for membership is often called to mind in Europe – Ukraine could at least focus on realising the potential of the most extensive association agreement in history.
In 2022, the context of the negotiations regarding EU–Ukraine relations changed dramatically. From an ever-moving prospect, Ukraine’s integration into the EU became one of very few elements capable of making some form of progress when it came to resolving the conflict.
NATO is not an option
It is all about security guarantees. The Russian invasion forced Ukraine to prepare for the next war. No promises — whether written or verbal — would be enough. From now on, when it came to relations with Russia, any Ukrainian government would have to proceed on the basis of a worst-case scenario regarding the course of events.
The only way of preventing renewed aggression from Russia is either to rely on direct security guarantees, or to invest a significant share of resources in constructing and supporting effective, modern armed forces. Membership in NATO could also be an effective mechanism to guarantee security but this does not seem realistic and Russia has declared it a threat to its security.
The rationale that prevailed before the war continues to apply here: a high risk of direct conflict with Russia makes Ukraine’s aim of NATO accession more difficult. In light of this, there are ongoing discussions about security guarantees on the individual country level and even on a multilateral basis outside NATO.
This is a complex debate. Firstly, few are in a position to give such guarantees, especially when we are talking about a potential conflict with Russia. The US is probably the only country that could provide effective and credible guarantees. It is the only country with the capacity to project its military power to an extent that would deter Russia.
Secondly, there are not many countries that would be willing to provide security guarantees carrying such high future risks. That said, the West cannot afford to refuse a dialogue on the issue of security guarantees because a continuation of the conflict in its current state presents Europe with serious problems.
Membership of the European Union, on the other hand, does not seem to antagonise Russia in the same way. In its pre-war rhetoric, Moscow never raised the issue of EU expansion and never accused the EU of being a threat to its security. This creates a certain amount of scope to pursue other possibilities.
Of course, EU membership cannot be seen as providing a complete security guarantee. However, it is capable of increasing the costs of aggression for Russia and providing the prospect of recovery for Ukraine’s frail economy. Such recovery would be a precondition for Ukraine to be able to sustain effective defence capabilities.
An open door for European membership
Obviously, it is not as simple as this. At the conceptual level, and this is something many European officials have already pointed out, it is impossible to force EU membership, even with the ‘accelerated procedure’. It is a lengthy and complex process requiring coordination of a myriad aspects, from legislation to technical standards.
Even the most optimistic assessments of Ukrainian politicians and diplomats suggest that the process could take several years. Austria, Sweden, and Finland joined in record speed, and the process still took around four years. Since then, the situation has not got any easier, indeed it has arguably become more complex as the number of legal norms and standards within the EU has increased significantly.
Moreover, there is already a ‘queue’ of five other countries waiting to join. These are all undeniably relevant obstacles, given the strong impact of EU bureaucracy and procedures even in these exceptional circumstances.
At the political level, there must be a consensus among all the member states of the EU. The overall situation in Europe has changed so much that rather than the purely symbolic support provided before the war in the form of declarations signed by a number of European states, today there is a broad social consensus when it comes to Ukraine’s European future.
This consensus was already manifested in the official statements from heads of various Eastern European countries asserting that Ukraine deserved to be provided the immediate prospect of membership.
Public opinion throughout Europe is gradually leaning towards supporting this idea – this is also evident in the reactions of national parliaments to the addresses given by the Ukrainian president.
Today, there are very few European politicians who would formally object to the very idea of Ukraine having a future in Europe. Of course, the task will not necessarily be easy. The sympathy and empathy expressed by Europeans towards Ukraine now needs to be translated into political results.
Mobilising the support of the most influential EU member states – Germany and France – will be of critical importance. What is required here is extremely delicate diplomacy and a thorough understanding of Berlin’s and Paris’ interests.
This includes restoring European security. Furthermore, taking this path would require putting an end to old disagreements or, at the very least, map out the prospects of this being achieved.
A question of European security
Yet all the key arguments pertain to security matters. It is not just about Ukraine protecting Europe from Russian revisionism at the cost of so many lives — and how EU membership could serve as a gesture of recognition of the importance of the country’s contribution to European security.
The issue is also that this European security is unlikely to be possible if Ukraine, as before the war, continues to remain in Europe’s ‘grey zone’, without allies, guarantees or a certain future. The threats for Ukraine may not be the same threats as for Europe – however, since Russia’s invasion, everything has fundamentally changed.
In the two months since the start of the conflict, Ukraine is no better prepared for EU membership than before the war. For Europeans, Ukraine joining the EU will be associated with certain risks and problems. But something else has changed as well – the overall situation when it comes to European security.
A continuation of the war will cost Europe far more. The EU can no longer stand by and wait, it, too needs to find a way out of the war being waged by Russia.
If Ukraine is granted the candidate country status in June, this will be an encouraging signal for everyone. That which up until 24 February seemed an impossibility, would become a subject of discussion and an entirely realistic, albeit somewhat remote prospect.
Nickolay Kapitonenko is an associate professor at the Institute of International Relations at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and director of the Centre for International Relations Studies.
Source: International Politics and Society (IPS)-Journal published by the International Political Analysis Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin
The protestors’ main rallying slogan is ‘GotaGoHome’
Opinion by Neville de Silva (london)
Inter Press Service
LONDON, May 04 (IPS) – When I ended last month’s column hoping that April would not prove to be hapless Sri Lanka’s ‘cruellest month’ (in the words TS Eliot), I hardly anticipated the current turn of events.
In April, the country was to celebrate several ethno-religious festivals. The biggest among them was the Sinhala and Tamil New Year, celebrated by Sri Lanka’s majority community and its main minority. It was also the Muslim month of Ramadan and Easter, commemorated by the Christians.
For over one-and-a-half years Sri Lanka had been grappling with a fast-failing economy. The dwindling of foreign reserves and the consequent shortages of food, medicines, fuel, gas and kerosene for cooking were more recently compounded by power cuts, at times as long as 12hoursper day, bringing manufacturing industries to a standstill and forcing businesses to close down early.
With the country struggling to avert bankruptcy and an unprecedented rise in inflation and spiralling commodity prices, many working-class families, daily wage earners and farmers were facing penury and starvation.
Against this dire background Sri Lanka’s 22 million people were anxiously preparing for the April festivities, wondering whether there would be anything to celebrate.
Then it happened.
On March 31 the residents of Mirihana, a middle- class town on the outskirts of Colombo, held a candle-light protest to highlight the daily power cuts that disrupted their family activities. The protest, initially by women, attracted passers-by and huge crowds from neighbourhood towns and residential areas as President Gotabaya Rajapaksa lived in Mirihana in his private residence.
Swelling crowds shouting slogans later clashed with police firing tear gas and water cannons to break up the demonstration, but many of the protestors held their ground till the next day.
The Mirihana protest has sparked the island-wide conflagration that now has the once all-powerful Rajapaksa family-run government teetering on the wall like Humpty Dumpty awaiting a splintering fall. It will remain an important landmark in this uprising, which some have called, rather erroneously, Sri Lanka’s ‘Arab Spring’.
Mirihana began the assault against the Rajapaksa fiefdom that once seemed impregnable. Gotabaya Rajapaksa is president. Brother Mahinda, who served two terms as president, is currently prime minister. Another brother, Basil, a dual citizen with US citizenship and a home in Los Angeles, was until last month finance minister, and the eldest brother Chamal holds the post ofirrigation minister and state minister of security. Mahinda’s eldest son Namal, whom his father sees as heir apparent, was sports and youth affairs minister, among other portfolios.
It appears that the prime minister suspects he is going to be sacrificed on the altar of expediency
Together, the family reportedly controlled 72 per cent of government resources, free to use as they deemed fit, even to farm off to their acolytes and business friends in the way of government contracts and import monopolies, even during the Covid pandemic.
Today, however, that fortress of power and privilege appears as exposed as France’s Maginot Line, set to crumble against a German Blitzkrieg.
All the Rajapaksas, except Prime Minister Mahinda, lost their positions last month when President Gotabaya suddenly dissolved the cabinet in a desperate attempt to quell the mounting outrage against him. It seemed a weak moral sidestep, for the protesters’ cry was not only against the president but against the entire Rajapaksa family, which they claimed had dipped their hands into the country’s assets for personal gain.
Mirihana lit the fuse for the enormous protest that flared up at Colombo’s beach-front Galle Face Green, right opposite the Presidential Secretariat from where political power radiated. It was this that breached the Rajapaksa citadel.
Economists urged the government seek IMF assistance
At the time of writing, this protest – which shows signs of unifying the country’s multiracial, multi-religious society and has drawn crowds of all ages and a wide cross-section of the Sri Lankan community, including the professional classes – has entered its 17thcontinuous day, with hundreds of protesters camped there day and night despite the heat and rain.
Yet it is no Arab Spring. It is an orderly, non-violent protest, mainly of youth of all shades, with an inventive genius to keep themselves and their cause alive.
Never in Sri Lanka’s 74 years of post-independence history has the country seen anything like this, even though anti-government protests are nothing new to the country, which has seen Leftist political parties and associated trade unions functioning even under British colonial rule.
The main rallying slogan is ‘GotaGoHome’, telling Gotabaya to return to his home – also in Los Angeles –though he relinquished his US citizenship to be eligible to contest the presidential election in November 2019.
Built round that slogan are a myriad other satirical comments in song, verse, caricatures, cartoons and videos, the creative work of the protesters deriding the Rajapaksas, some demanding they return the country’s supposedly stolen assets and otherwise accumulated wealth in tax havens.
Although the protesters are now demanding that the whole Rajapaksa family pack their bags and quit, the main target quite rightly is President Gotabaya. It was his military arrogance – having played a role in the defeat of the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam(LTTE) in 2009, under the leadership of his president brother Mahinda – and his ignorance of politics and governance, and over-reliance on incompetent advisers that started the economic rot.
With a group of retired and serving military men appointed to key civilian positions and a coterie of so-called intellectuals and businessmen as advisers, he plunged head-first into economic policy decisions.
Within a few days of assuming office, he had slashed VAT from 15 per cent to 8per cent and abolished some other taxes that cost the state a whopping 28 per cent in revenue. It led the Central Bank to print money feverishly to meet budgetary commitments, causing inflation.
Also disastrous was the overnight decision to ban chemical fertilisers that drove farmers to burn effigies of ministers and demonstrate on the streets, demanding restitution of their fertiliser needs or face food insecurity in the months ahead, forcing a once adamant president to retract.
While economists had foreseen the impending danger in depleting foreign reserves and international debt repayments this year, and hence urged the government seek IMF assistance, the president clung steadfastly to the advice of the Central Bank Governor and the Treasury Secretary, among others, who dismissed the idea for more than one year even ignoring cabinet support for IMF help.
In a belated gesture, President Gotabaya sacked the two officials immediately after replacing his cabinet with younger, untested MPs. He sent his new finance minister to Washington to plead with the IMF for immediate relief.
The president is hoping for political concessions he has agreed to – including returning to parliament and the prime minister powers that he usurped on coming to office through the 20thconstitutional amendment. He has now agreed to form an interim All Party government.
But one sees a growing rift in the once close-knit family. Names proposed by Prime Minister Mahinda for the new cabinet were ignored by his brother, causing the prime minister to boycott the swearing-in of the new ministers.
If the president opts for an interim government, it means he has decided to stay put but call for the prime minister’s resignation. It would appear that the prime minister suspects he is going to be sacrificed on the altar of expediency.
In an interview the other day, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa insisted that he will not resign and any reconstituted government must be under his leadership. In the meantime, he has been trying to whip up support against his ouster by canvassing MPs to muster the required 113 votes.
How the protesting public will react to all these political manipulations will depend on what is on offer. Right now, they are determined to continue until President Gotabaya surrenders, which seems unlikely.
Source: Asian Affairs, London
Neville de Silva is a veteran Sri Lankan journalist who held senior roles in Hong Kong at The Standard and worked in London for Gemini News Service. He has been a correspondent for foreign media including the New York Times and Le Monde. More recently he was Sri Lanka’s Deputy High Commissioner in London.
The day shines a spotlight on the essential work they do, bringing those in power to account, with transparency, “often at great person risk”, said Secretary-General António Guterres, in a video message.
Frontlines of crises
“Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, many media workers have been on the frontlines, providing accurate, science-based reporting to inform decision-makers and save lives”, he said.
“At the same time, journalists who cover climate, biodiversity and pollution have succeeded in bringing global attention to this triple planetary crisis.”
But the threats to their freedom to go about their reporting and story-telling fairly and accurately, are multiplying daily.
“From global health to the climate crisis, corruption, and human rights abuses, they face increased politicization of their work and attempts to silence them from many sides.
“Digital technology has democratized access to information. But it has also created serious challenges.”
Feeding on outrage, lies
The UN chief noted that many social media platforms make their money not through increasing access to fact-based reporting, but on boosting engagement, “which often means provoking outrage, and spreading lies.”
“Media workers in war zones are threatened not only by bombs and bullets, but by the weapons of falsification and disinformation that accompany modern warfare. They may be attacked as the enemy, accused of espionage, detained, or killed, simply for doing their jobs.”
Mr. Guterres said that digital technology, was also making censorship easier for authoritarian governments and others, seeking to suppress the truth, with many journalists and editors facing the prospect of their work being taken offline on a daily basis.
Women at ‘particular risk’
Digital technology is also creating new “channels for oppression and abuse”, with women journalists “at particular risk” of online harassment and violence.
The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, has found that nearly three-quarters of women respondents, had experienced online violence. Hacking and illegal surveillance also prevent journalists from doing their jobs.
“The methods and tools change, but the goal of discrediting the media and covering up the truth remains the same as ever”, said the UN chief, leading to citizens who live in societies without free media, being “manipulated in horrifying ways.”
No democracy
“Without freedom of the press, there are no real democratic societies. Without freedom of the press, there is no freedom”, he said.
Ten years ago, the UN established a Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists, to protect media workers and end impunity for crimes committed against them, and the UN is continuing to fight to protect their rights.
This year’s World Press Freedom Day Global Conference, began on Monday, and will run until 5 May in Punta Del Este, Uruguay, built around the theme Journalism under Digital Siege.
Participants will discuss the impact of the digital era on freedom of expression, the safety of journalists, access to information and privacy. World Press Freedom Day events will reunite relevant stakeholders such as policymakers, journalists, media representatives, activists, cybersecurity managers and legal experts to explore these issues and develop concrete solutions to address the threats posed to press freedom and privacy in the digital age.
Secretary-General António Guterres issued a statement hailing the “powerful testament” that the convention represents, as a successful example of multilateralism, and the security that it can provide.
“We cannot allow an erosion of this essential pillar of the disarmament and non-proliferation regime,” he said. “There can be no justification for their use”.
‘Abhorrent weapons’
The UN chief reminded that the use of chemical weapons is a serious violation of international law.
“It is imperative that those responsible for using these abhorrent weapons are identified and held accountable, for the sake of the victims and to prevent any future chemical warfare”.
In its statement, the Security Council underscored its commitment to never use them “anywhere, at any time”, or under “under any circumstance”.
The Council member also reiterated their call for “the complete destruction of chemical weapons stockpiles and abandoned chemical weapons,” in accordance with what’s formally known as the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on Their Destruction (CWC), which entered into force on 29 April 1997.
Moreover, they condemned the use of these indiscriminate, inhumane weapons in conflicts such as the Syrian civil war, over the past quarter of a century.
For humanity’s sake
The Council stressed that no one should, “under any circumstances” develop, produce, acquire, stockpile, or retain chemical weapons.
Nor should anyone transfer, directly or indirectly, chemical weapons; engage in any military preparations to use chemical weapons; or assist, “encourage or induce, in any way, anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State party under the Convention.”
They reaffirmed that “the development, production and use of chemical weapons, as prohibited by the Convention, remained a clear threat to international peace and security”.
Recognizing OPCW
Ambassadors also urged all States that have not yet done so, to become parties to the CWC “without delay”.
The statement concluded with their recognizing the crucial role of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) – the body responsible to ensure the “impartial, independent and professional implementation of all provisions of the Convention.”
Faltering compliance
Meanwhile, at a high-level event in the Security Council? making the 25th anniversary, the High Representative for Disarmament Affairs argued that the norm against chemical weapons has been repeatedly and fundamentally challenged.
According to Izumi Nakamitsu, this has been driven by a lack of strict compliance by some, a deteriorating international security environment, the rise of dangerous non-State actors, and developments in science and technology.
“The international community must act together to shore up the norm against the use of chemical weapons, to hold to account anyone who would stoop to using them and to revive the global regime,” she said.
Syria challenge
The UN disarmament chief noted that the toxic chemicals have been used with impunity as weapons in Syria, describing it as an immediate challenge facing the CWC.
“The gaps, inconsistencies and discrepancies in Syria’s initial and subsequent declarations to the OPCW must be resolved,” she said, adding that the Government of the war-torn and divided country, after more than a decade of fighting, must also allow “immediate and unfettered access for the OPCW”.
Without Syria’s cooperation, the international community cannot have confidence that the country is abiding by its commitments.
Address ‘profound violations’
Ms. Nakamitsu said that if we fail to both identify the perpetrators of chemical weapon attacks and hold them accountable, “we will further damage the norm against the use of chemical weapons”.
“Such profound violations of international law cannot continue to go unaddressed and unresolved”.
Highlighting the growing challenges that they pose, the senior UN official urged for stronger collaboration to “restore the taboo against chemical weapons” and finally consign them “to the pages of history”.
Rural women are often targeted by human traffickers and taken across borders in Africa and forced to become sex workers. Credit: Aimable Twahirwa/IPS
by Aimable Twahirwa (kigali)
Inter Press Service
KIGALI, Apr 29 (IPS) – Desperate to escape the rural area where she was engaged in the informal economy in Kayonza, a district in Eastern Rwanda, Sharon* made a long and arduous journey to Kenya in the hope of a well-paid job.
An unidentified individual contacted her, paid for her ticket, and gave her a modest amount of pocket money to travel to Kenya by road. The person told the 19-year-old she was traveling to take up an “employment opportunity”.
However, Sharon found herself in sexual servitude at a karaoke bar on the outskirts of the Kenyan capital Nairobi.
Sharon’s job was to bow elegantly to all customers at the door and usher them inside the bar.
“I was also hired as a nightclub dancer and sometimes forced by my employer to engage in sexual intercourse with clients to earn a living,” the high school graduate told IPS in an interview.
Like Sharon, activists say the number of young women from rural areas trafficked into the sex trade across many East African countries is growing. The young women are lured with the promise of good jobs or marriage. Instead, they are sold into prostitution in cities such as Nairobi (Kenya) and Kampala (Uganda).
Both activists and lawmakers warn that people with hidden agendas could target young women from Rwanda.
The process of trafficking most of these young women into neighboring countries is complex. It involves false promises to their families and victims in which they are promised a “better life”, activists say.
In many cases, traffickers lure young women from rural villages to neighboring countries with the promise of well-paid work. Then, victims are transferred to people who become their enslavers – especially in dubious hotels and karaoke bars.
While Rwanda has tried to combat human trafficking, law enforcement agencies stress that the main challenge revolves around the financial and other assistance for repatriated victims. Limited budgets of the institutions in charge of investigation and rehabilitation of the victims have meant that these programmes are not working optimally.
The chairperson of the East African Legislative Assembly’s Committee on Regional Affairs and Conflict Resolution, Fatuma Ndangiza, warned that if no urgent measures are undertaken, the problem is likely to worsen.
“Most of these young women without employment were victims of a well-established human trafficking ring operating under the guise of employment agencies in the region,” Ndangiza told IPS.
The latest figures by Rwanda Investigation Bureau (RIB) indicate that 119 cases of human trafficking, illegal migration, and smuggling of migrants in the region were investigated in the last three years.
These involved 215 victims, among whom 165 were females and 59 males.
Driven by the demand for cheap labor and commercial sex, trafficking rings across the East African region capitalize primarily on economic and social vulnerabilities to exploit their victims, experts said.
But estimates by the UN International Organization for Migration (IOM) show that the lack of relevant legislation and needed administrative institutions across the East African region have continued to give traffickers and smugglers an undue advantage to carry on their activities.
To prevent human trafficking, Rwanda has adopted several measures, including passing a new law in 2018.
Under the current legislation, offenders face up to 15 years of imprisonment, but activists say this measure is not enough deterrent.
Although law enforcement officers were trained in combatting human trafficking, Evariste Murwanashyaka, a fervent defender of human rights who is based in Kigali, told IPS that enforcing laws is a challenge, mainly because it is hard to detect women who are engaged in sex work or other forms of sexual exploitation in neighboring countries.
“Young women are still more likely to become targets of trafficking due to the growing demand for sexual slavery across the region, ” he said.
Now with the COVID-19 pandemic, activists say there is not only a lack of awareness but people, especially youth, who are unaware they are victims of a human trafficking offense.
“Most informal job offers from abroad for these young people are associated with illicit businesses, such as human trafficking, mainly of women, and their sexual and labor exploitation,” Murwanashyaka told IPS
According to the Africa Centre for Strategic Studies, the increasing unemployment rates, malnourishment, and school closures have increased human trafficking.
Meanwhile, RIB spokesperson, Dr Thierry Murangira is convinced that human trafficking is a transnational organized crime.
“Being transnational organized crimes, “this requires the involvement of more than one jurisdiction and regional cooperation to investigate and prosecute the crime,” he said.
This article is part of a series of features from across the globe on human trafficking. IPS coverage is supported by the Airways Aviation Group.
The Global Sustainability Network ( GSN ) is pursuing the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal number 8 with a special emphasis on Goal 8.7, which “takes immediate and effective measures to eradicate forced labor, end modern slavery and human trafficking, and secure the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labor, including recruitment and use of child soldiers, and by 2025 end child labor in all its forms”.
The origins of the GSN come from the endeavors of the Joint Declaration of Religious Leaders signed on 2 December 2014. Religious leaders of various faiths gathered to work together “to defend the dignity and freedom of the human being against the extreme forms of the globalization of indifference, such as exploitation, forced labor, prostitution, human trafficking”.
TORONTO, Canada, Apr 29 (IPS) – The UN will be commemorating World Press Freedom Day on May 3. The following article is part of a series of IPS features and opinion pieces focused on media freedom globally.Empowered by a global pandemic and the drum beats of war, the strongest despots are growing more despotic, and criminal cartels even more brazen in their violence. Extremists of various hues are also stepping out of the shadows.
Just when the world most needs press freedom to thrive, the liberties that societies only really treasure when they are emasculated are coming under more pressure from different directions, old and new.
Farhana Haque RahmanThe 2021 World Press Freedom Index measured by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) declined last year, and is 12% down since first issued in 2013. RSF reported “a dramatic deterioration in people’s access to information and an increase in obstacles to news coverage”. The coronavirus pandemic was cited as widely used to block journalists’ access to information.
Lest you think that this deterioration is the preserve of less developed countries under autocratic rule, RSF noted an increase in attacks against journalists and arbitrary arrests in Germany, France, Italy and several other European states.
This year –as we approach World Press Freedom Day on May 3 — is measurably worse already, notably in Russia and China, but also in Mexico with an escalation of targeted killings of journalists by suspected drug traffickers.
Some 200 Russian journalists and several dozen foreign reporters have left Russia since the passing of a draconian media law on March 4 which criminalises “deliberately false” information. It outlaws calling the invasion of Ukraine a “war”. In addition Russia is still applying its “foreign agents” legislation to punish and intimidate critical media outlets, including PASMI dedicated exclusively to fighting corruption.
“The Russian authorities’ crackdown on independent media is escalating at breakneck speed. Evidently unsatisfied with merely blocking critical news sites or forcing reporters into exile, the Kremlin now seeks to incarcerate journalists who report on anti-war protests or Russian soldiers who refuse to fight in Ukraine,” Amnesty International said on April 14 commenting on the arrests of two journalists in the Russian republics of Altay and Khakassia.
“Apart from state propaganda, there is no media landscape in Russia,” Journalist Alexey Kovalyov, now based in Riga, told Al Jazeera. The power of that propaganda must not be underestimated. Accounts are widespread of people living in Ukraine telling relatives in Russia that they are being bombed by the Russian army but their own family members refuse to believe them.
The “world’s biggest jailer of press freedom defenders”, reports RSF, is however China, with 115 men and women currently incarcerated. China ranks 177 out of the 180 countries and territories surveyed. “Media freedom in China is declining at breakneck speed,” the Foreign Correspondents Club (FCC) stated in January. China has labelled the FCC an “illegal organisation” and appears in its rhetoric to be encouraging an exodus of foreign journalists.
Free media in Hong Kong, once among the freest in Asia, has been almost completely dismantled, according to Hong Kong Watch, a UK-based advocacy group. Its recent report followed the HK FCC’s announcement it would suspend its Human Rights Press Awards as it risked violating the city’s national security law imposed by Beijing in 2020.
Whereas Russia and China are deploying “lawfare” against independent journalists and big companies in developed countries are stifling the press with “vexatious” lawsuits, it is more a legal wasteland or absence of the state that is killing journalists in Mexico, among others.
A wave of murders has targeted at least eight journalists so far this year, with seven killed in all of 2021, making Mexico under populist President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador one of the most dangerous countries for the press. Journalists, in the words of Adela Navarro Bello, director of the Tijuana weekly Zeta, are “caught in the crossfire between the threats and bullets of narco-traffickers and organised crime and the threats and verbal attacks and attempts to morally annihilate us from the federal and state governments”.
International human rights organisation Article 19 says the Mexican government’s denial of what is happening “results in no urgent measures being taken to stop this brutal spiral of violence”.
A similar pattern is seen in Bangladesh where suspected narco-traffickers killed Bangladeshi journalist Mohiuddin Sarker Nayeem on April 13.
The Committee to Protect Journalists publishes an annual Global Impunity Index and notes that no one has been held to account in 81% of journalist murders worldwide over the past 10 years. Somalia tops the list, with Mexico ranked 6th and Bangladesh 11th.
State-sponsored or tolerated violence and political persecution aside, world press freedom is also being eroded in an insidious way in places where such freedoms are commonly understood to be vital in sustaining well-functioning democracies. Coupled with the apparently unstoppable rise of social media as a source of information – some surveys suggest 50% of adults in the US and UK get their news from social media – the state of much of the traditional press, digital or not, is far from healthy.
The annual Digital News Report by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism found the US ranked last in media trust, at 29%, among 92,000 news consumers polled in 46 countries. (Finland came top).
Governments must not be passive while the same powerful corporate lobbies that have spent fortunes over decades spreading climate dis/misinformation in traditional media now feed on the rapacity of Big Tech social media, which are failing to disclose comprehensive policies to combat this. Climate disinformation as a threat to climate action is highlighted in the latest UN Climate Reports.
Press offices of international organisations, particularly the UN and large INGOs, also have a particular responsibility to uphold media freedom by eschewing the corporate dark arts of delay, denial and obfuscation.
A new proposal by the EU executive to protect journalists and campaigners from so-called vexatious lawsuits is highly welcome. The move would target “strategic lawsuits against public participation” known as Slapps, where the rich misuse legal means to silence troublesome investigative reporters and NGOs.
No press freedom, no democracy. Just like freedom of speech, that does not mean a free press can publish whatever it wants. Both need to be defined and, in these very dark times, defended.
Farhana Haque Rahman is Senior Vice President of IPS Inter Press Service and Executive Director IPS North America, including it’s UN Bureau; she served as the elected Director General of IPS from 2015-2019. A journalist and communications expert, she is a former senior official of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.
Outlining a new four-pronged investigation strategy to the Security Council on Thursday, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) pledged his commitment to delivering justice against crimes committed in Libya.
“This situation cannot be a never-ending story”, said Karim Khan, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. “Justice delayed may not always be justice denied, but justice that can still be arrived at.”
Prosecutor #KarimAAKhanQC outlines his renewed strategy in the #Libya situation: “Our new approach prioritises the voices of survivors. To do so we must move closer to them. We cannot conduct investigations, we cannot build trust, while working at arms length from those affected” pic.twitter.com/CLxgHMs4zh
In his key prosecutorial role for under a year, Mr. Khan is having to reckon with multiple alleged perpetrators of crimes against humanity, and war crimes, together with three unexecuted warrants of arrest, amid a politically divided nation that continues to suffer from widespread impunity, stemming from the overthrow of long-term ruler, Muammar Gaddafi, in 2011.
The internationally-recognized Government in Tripoli, is still at odds with a rival administration and parliamentary authority in the east, while a “deepening crackdown” on civil society is having a “chilling effect on human rights defenders”, according to the UN rights office, OHCHR, in a report last month.
New impetus
Presenting the 23rd report on the Libyan file, Mr. Khan said survivors and the families of victims are waiting for justice, and the report contains benchmarks for the first time to help move cases forward.
“Our new approach prioritises the voices of survivors”, he said. “To do so we must move closer to them. We cannot conduct investigations, we cannot build trust, while working at arms-length from those affected”
He said the first pillar of the new approach is to prioritise the referrals made by the Council, by allocating additional resources and focusing on enhancing financial investigation, together with increasing capacity in investigating sexual and gender-based crimes.
To accelerate investigations, his team is also harnessing the power of new technology, including artificial intelligence and machine learning to support the transcription and translation of Arabic language documentary, video and audio files.
The second is a commitment to empower witnesses and survivors to participate in the Office’s work. The Hague, where the Court is based, is far from Libya. It is not possible to establish meaningful relationships with victims, by engaging at arms’ length. It is vital to work shoulder-to-shoulder with the affected communities, he told ambassadors.
More on-site investigation
“We need to be more on the ground,” he said, adding that the Office is establishing an enhanced field presence.
The third is to strengthen engagement with Libyan authorities, focusing on supporting national accountability efforts based on the principle of complementarity.
Where national authorities can take forward genuine proceedings, his Office should be there to support, he said.
Focus on justice
But, if Libyan authorities appear unable to carry out investigations or prosecutions of crimes under the jurisdiction of the Court, his Office will continue to do its work. He said he will visit Libya in the coming reporting period to deepen the Court’s relationships with the Libyan authorities.
The fourth new approach, he said, was to increase avenues for accountability by enhancing cooperation with third States, international and regional organisations.
He said he does not want his Office to be only a recipient of cooperation from relevant national authorities, but a positive contributor to national accountability processes. This must be “a two-way street”, the ICC Prosecutor urged.
Asian Americans affected by anti-Asian sentiment and hate crimes have provided support to each other. Left to right from top: Dr Boyung Lee, Dr Russell Jeung, Cynthia Choi, Myleen Hollero, and Dr Bryant Lin. Credit: Myleen Hollero
by Seimi Chu (california)
Inter Press Service
California, Apr 28 (IPS) – Dr Boyung Lee, a widow and the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the Faculty at Iliff School of Theology, would use a short break in her working day to walk around her neighborhood. The fresh air helped her deal with her grief and work-related stress.
In May 2020, however, this small but significant daily ritual ended abruptly.
Lee was walking when she noticed a dirty white truck but did not think much of it. She carried on walking, then heard something. The noise continued, and when she looked back, she noticed the driver inside the truck was shouting at her.
Dr Boyung Lee was targeted by a truck driver on this street on S Elati Street near W Bates Avenue in Englewood, Colorado.
Listening carefully, Lee realized that he was jeering at her – including using one of the common taunts directed at the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) community: “Go back to your country.”
Slightly shaken by this hostile confrontation, Lee continued walking. However, the driver followed her. Thankfully, Lee acted swiftly and ran into the opening of her neighbor’s apartment building, so the driver could not follow her.
The incident made her feel unsafe. She was even nervous about grocery shopping. The verbal attack turned a Korean American independent feminist into a dependent person.
Lee now covered herself with masks and hats to prevent others from noticing that she was an Asian.
She started to feel safe when her peers offered to go with her on her walks. However, outside of that, Lee was afraid. It took Lee over a year to feel comfortable going out to work by herself.
Angered because her experience had turned her into a dependent person, Lee thought about how she could educate the public about the beauty of Asian culture.
Dr Boyung Lee ran into the opening of this apartment building when the truck driver followed her. Targeted because she is an Asian American, the incident resulted in a loss of independence until she became involved in hosting lectures and workshops about Asian culture and art. Credit: Supplied
By teaming up with a few Asian colleagues, she brought in Asian American artists. She hosted lectures and workshops to educate the community about the intersection of Asian culture and art. Through this experience, Lee felt empowered and returned to being the independent feminist she once was.
Lee is not alone in her experiences of Asian hate abuse. Many in the AAPI community faced harassment, discrimination, and abuse.
When a Pacific Islander spoke Chamorro at a mall in Dallas, Texas, a passerby coughed on her and jeered: “You and your people are the reason why we have corona. Go sail a boat back to your island.”
A mother tried to enroll her daughter in a gymnastics class in Tustin, California. However, the owner refused because the mother’s name was ‘Asian’. These were two of the numerous incidents reported by Stop AAPI Hate, a support group that works to end racism.
From March 19, 2020, when the pandemic emerged, until December 31, 2021, there were over 10,000 incidents reported to Stop AAPI Hate, of which 4,632 happened in 2020 and 6,273 in 2021. Based on the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism’s data, there was a 339% increase in anti-Asian hate crimes in 2021 compared with the previous year.
The increase in hate crimes against Asian Americans stems from the virus’s origin. COVID-19 was first identified in Wuhan province, China. Due to its origin, hostile rhetoric was used to connote the coronavirus, such as “Kung Flu”, “Chinese virus”, and the “Wuhan virus.” Racializing the virus led to an uptick in anti-Asian racism, prejudice, discrimination, and hate crimes. Common verbal harassment included: “Go back to China” and “Take your virus, you Chinks!”
The most recent report released by Stop AAPI Hate found that 63% of the hate incidents involved verbal harassment, 16.2% involved physical assault, 11.5% involved civil rights violations, and 8.6% involved online harassment. Most occurred in public spaces, such as public streets and public transits.
Asian Americans were blamed for “bringing the virus” to America.
Russell Jeung, professor of Asian American Studies at San Francisco State University, worked with Cynthia Choi, Co-Executive Director of Chinese Affirmative Action, with other leaders, spearheaded the mission to fight anti-Asian racism. Jeung wanted to provide Asian American communities with resources, so this harassment would not happen again.
Along with Choi and Manjusha Kulkarni, Director of the AAPI Equity Alliance, Jeung founded Stop AAPI Hate to find solutions to the underlying causes of discrimination and hate. He formed a research team of San Francisco State University students to collect data to create the reports published on the Stop AAPI website. Jeung and his students discovered that hate crimes against Asian Americans occurred most frequently in California.
Jeung also noticed Asian Americans were taking a stance against racism.
Asian Americans used their social media platforms and utilized hashtags, such as #Racismisavirus, to ensure their posts would go viral. Another trend Jeung witnessed was that Asian Americans elected officials who would speak up against xenophobia.
As a result, Asian Americans turned out in their numbers to vote in 2020. As Jeung explained, Asian Americans voted for candidates who would support their beliefs and promised to fight against xenophobia.
Chinese Affirmative Action, a support community-based civil rights organization to protect the rights of Chinese and Asian Americans, and Stop AAPI Hate, collected first-hand accounts of people who self-reported what was happening and what was said to them.
The two organizations have been working on advancing racial equity by dealing with racial tensions between the Asian communities and other communities. These reports helped them understand the nature of the violent attacks. So far, over 3,700 cases have been reported to these organizations. They also work with the media to share the information.
“Certainly, in my lifetime, we have not witnessed this level of hate directed at our communities,” Choi lamented.
Bryant Lin, a Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine and Co-Director and Co-Founder of the Center for Asian Health Research and Education, led a project that researched people’s perception of the relationship between COVID-19 and discrimination. They surveyed nearly 2,000 people across the country.
Lin explained the results of his study. “Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, and other Asian Pacific Islanders showed up to 3.9 times increased odds of self-reported racial discrimination due to COVID-19 and experienced nearly up to 5.4 times increased odds of concern for physical assault due to COVID-19.”
Although Asians are very diverse and heterogeneous – there are six major subgroups in the United States – they are treated as a monolithic group. Lin revealed that East Asians tended to experience more discrimination than South and Southeast Asians. The highest rates of self-reported discrimination were from Chinese Americans.
“Our study also found that people were very concerned about physical attacks, and people were also considering buying firearms,” Lin said. He added they were likely to do a further study on how perceptions changed.
Every other Tuesday, a working group of Mayan women meets to review the organization and progress of their food saving and production project in Uayma, in the state of Yucatán in southeastern Mexico. CREDIT: Courtesy of the Ko’ox Tani Foundation
by Emilio Godoy (uayma, mexico)
Inter Press Service
UAYMA, Mexico, Apr 26 (IPS) – Every other Tuesday at 5:00 p.m. sharp, a group of 26 Mexican women meet for an hour to discuss the progress of their work and immediate tasks. Anyone who arrives late must pay a fine of about 25 cents on the dollar.
The collective has organized in the municipality of Uayma (which means “Not here” in the Mayan language) to learn agroecological practices, as well as how to save money and produce food for family consumption and the sale of surpluses.
“We have to be responsible. With savings we can do a little more,” María Petul, a married Mayan indigenous mother of two and a member of the group “Lool beh” (“Flower of the road” in Mayan), told IPS in this municipality of just over 4,000 inhabitants, 1,470 kilometers southeast of Mexico City in the state of Yucatán, on the Yucatán peninsula.
The home garden “gives me enough to eat and sell, it helps me out,” said Petul as she walked through her small garden where she grows habanero peppers (Capsicum chinense, traditional in the area), radishes and tomatoes, surrounded by a few trees, including a banana tree whose fruit will ripen in a few weeks and some chickens that roam around the earthen courtyard.
The face of Norma Tzuc, who is also married with two daughters, lights up with enthusiasm when she talks about the project. “I am very happy. We now have an income. It’s exciting to be able to help my family. Other groups already have experience and tell us about what they’ve been doing,” Tzuc told IPS.
The two women and the rest of their companions, whose mother tongue is Mayan, participate in the project “Women saving to address climate change”, run by the non-governmental Ko’ox Tani Foundation (“Let’s Go Ahead”, in Mayan), dedicated to community development and social inclusion, based in Merida, the state capital.
This phase of the project is endowed with some 100,000 dollars from the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC), the non-binding environmental arm of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), formed in 1994 by Canada, the United States and Mexico and replaced in 2020 by another trilateral agreement.
The initiative got off the ground in February and will last two years, with the aim of training some 250 people living in extreme poverty, mostly women, in six locations in the state of Yucatán.
The maximum savings for each woman in the group is about 12 dollars every two weeks and the minimum is 2.50 dollars, and they can withdraw the accumulated savings to invest in inputs or animals, or for emergencies, with the agreement of the group. Through the project, the women will receive seeds, agricultural inputs and poultry, so that they can install vegetable gardens and chicken coops on their land.
The women write down the quotas in a white notebook and deposit the savings in a gray box, kept in the house of the group’s president.
José Torre, project director of the Ko’ox Tani Foundation, explained that the main areas of entrepreneurship are: community development, food security, livelihoods and human development.
“What we have seen over time is that the savings meetings become a space for human development, in which they find support and solidarity from their peers, make friends and build trust,” he told IPS during a tour of the homes of some of the savings group participants in Uayma.
The basis for the new initiative in this locality is a similar program implemented between 2018 and 2021 in other Yucatecan municipalities, in which the organization worked with 1400 families.
María Petul, a Mayan indigenous woman, plants chili peppers, tomatoes, radishes and medicinal herbs in the vegetable garden in the courtyard of her home in Uayma, in the southeastern Mexican state of Yucatán. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy/IPS
Unequal oasis
Yucatan, a region home to 2.28 million people, suffers from a high degree of social backwardness, with 34 percent of the population living in moderate poverty, 33 percent suffering unmet needs, 5.5 percent experiencing income vulnerability and almost seven percent living in extreme poverty.
The COVID-19 pandemic that hit this Latin American country in February 2020 exacerbated these conditions in a state that depends on agriculture, tourism and services, similar to the other two states that make up the Yucatán Peninsula: Campeche and Quintana Roo.
Inequality is also a huge problem in the state, although the Gini Index dropped from 0.51 in 2014 to 0.45, according to a 2018 government report, based on data from 2016 (the latest year available). The Gini coefficient, where 1 indicates the maximum inequality and 0 the greatest equality, is used to calculate income inequality.
The situation of indigenous women is worse, as they face marginalization, discrimination, violence, land dispossession and lack of access to public services.
More than one million indigenous people live in the state.
Women participating in a project funded by the North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation record their savings in a white notebook and deposit them in a gray box. Mayan indigenous woman Norma Tzuc belongs to a group taking part in the initiative in Uayma, in the southeastern Mexican state of Yucatán. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy/IPS
Climate crisis, yet another vulnerability
Itza Castañeda, director of equity at the non-governmental World Resources Institute (WRI), highlights the persistence of structural inequalities in the peninsula that exacerbate the effects of the climate crisis.
“In the three states there is greater inequality between men and women. This stands in the way of women’s participation and decision-making. Furthermore, the existing evidence shows that there are groups in conditions of greater vulnerability to climate impacts,” she told IPS from the city of Tepoztlán, near Mexico City.
She added that “climate change accentuates existing inequalities, but a differentiated impact assessment is lacking.”
Official data indicate that there are almost 17 million indigenous people in Mexico, representing 13 percent of the total population, of which six million are women.
Of indigenous households, almost a quarter are headed by women, while 65 percent of indigenous girls and women aged 12 and over perform unpaid work compared to 35 percent of indigenous men – a sign of the inequality in the system of domestic and care work.
To add to their hardships, the Yucatan region is highly vulnerable to the effects of the climate crisis, such as droughts, devastating storms and rising sea levels. In June 2021, tropical storm Cristobal caused the flooding of Uayma, where three women’s groups are operating under the savings system.
For that reason, the project includes a risk management and hurricane early warning system.
The Mexican government is building a National Care System, but the involvement of indigenous women and the benefits for them are still unclear.
Petul looks excitedly at the crops planted on her land and dreams of a larger garden, with more plants and more chickens roaming around, and perhaps a pig to be fattened. She also thinks about the possibility of emulating women from previous groups who have set up small stores with their savings.
“They will lay eggs and we can eat them or sell them. With the savings we can also buy roosters, in the market chicks are expensive,” said Petul, brimming with hope, who in addition to taking care of her home and family sells vegetables.
Her neighbor Tzuc, who until now has been a homemaker, said that the women in her group have to take into account the effects of climate change. “It has been very hot, hotter than before, and there is drought. Fortunately, we have water, but we have to take care of it,” she said.
For his part, Torre underscored the results of the savings groups. The women “left extreme poverty behind. The pandemic hit hard, because there were families who had businesses and stopped selling. The organization gave them resilience,” he said.
In addition, a major achievement is that the households that have already completed the project continue to save, regularly attend meetings and have kept producing food.
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