Kofi Annan, kids on Nauru, floods in India, NGOs and languages, US Aid cuts and more

Posted on 21 August 2018

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+ Kofi Annan 'a secular pope' has died

Kofi Annan, nobel peace laureate, UN secretary-general during difficult times from 1997 to 2006 , and peace envoy to the end, has died.

The Financial Times (paywall) writes about this 'secular monk' and his "old-world charisma, unrufflability and monastic mien" that made him stand out as a global statesman.

He was particularly proud of overseeing the Millennium Development Goals.

But there was no doubt that the UN's inaction as genocide unfolded in Rwanda in 1994 and the Bosnian town of Srebrenica in 1995 were stains on his career. These were two of the UN peacekeeping operation's most criticised incidents under Annan’s leadership, writes Chris Johnston in The Guardian.

A memo went out in Annan's name, ordering the UN peacekeeping troops in Rwanda to avoid force at all costs.

He was haunted by that, and became a global champion for the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) mandate which created a framework under international law for states to intervene to protect citizens from genocide. The other pillars of R2P relate directly to the work of NGOs as well as governments: the Responsibility to Prevent, and the Responsibility to Rebuild.

In one of his final speeches, Annan said, “When power, especially military force, is used, the world will consider it legitimate only when convinced that it is being used for the right purpose – for broadly shared aims in accordance with broadly accepted norms,” he said.

He acknowledged more recently that the UN still had its faults. “The UN can be improved, it is not perfect but if it didn’t exist you would have to create it,” he told the BBC in an interview for his 80th birthday in April. “I am a stubborn optimist, I was born an optimist and will remain an optimist.”

Kumi Naidoo, Amnesty International’s secretary general, said the world had lost a great leader: “Kofi’s dedication and drive for a more peaceful and just world, his lifelong championing of human rights, and the dignity and grace with which he led will be sorely missed in a world which needs these characteristics more than ever.”

+ World vision - 'bring the kids on Nauru here'

World Vision New Zealand joined around 30 other organisations and advocacy groups to call for the Australian government to bring the more than 120 children and their families to Australia or New Zealand by Universal Children’s Day on 20 November.

The coalition includes World Vision New Zealand, the Australian Council for International Development, the Refugee Council of Australia, St Paul’s Anglican Cathedral, the Anglican Diocese of Sydney, Australian Lawyers Alliance, and the Australian arms of Save the Children, Oxfam, Amnesty International and Plan International.

The campaign highlights a number of children, including three-year-old Melanie (to her real name), writes Ben Doherty in The Guardian.

“It is so difficult to live in Nauru,” her mother said. “I wish on nobody that they are stuck here like us.”

The Australian government might have something else on its mind this week - like survival.

Meanwhile, the opposition Labor’s spokesman for immigration, Shayne Neumann, said the Australian government should take up New Zealand’s offer of resettling some refugees, given it had managed to do it with the US.

This will no doubt be a big issue at the Pacific Island Forum, due to start in the first week of September in Nauru.

The lead-up to the meeting has been marred with controversy, with the Nauru Government banning some media, and tension mounting over the asylum seekers and refugees being detained on Nauru, on behalf of the Australian Government, writes Laura Walters in Stuff.

There are about 119 children currently detained on Nauru - this number fluctuates, as children are often taken from the island for emergency medical treatment.

New CEO of World Vision NZ Grant Bayldon is using his well-respected record of campaigning for refugees while CEO of Amnesty, and has launched a campaign this week, calling on Ardern to accept all the children detained on Nauru, and their families, into New Zealand, as a special one-off refugee intake. This intake would sit outside New Zealand's annual refugee quota of 1000, which the Government has promised to increase to 1500.

+ World Humanitarian Day - one of the grimmest on record

Sunday, 19th August was World Humanitarian Day, and it's looking like one of the grimmest in years, with horrific images coming out of Yemen. CID put out a release to mark the day, highlighting the record number of civilian and humanitarian worker deaths in conflicts recently.

Devex highlights five key issues facing humanitarian workers to mark the day.

"At the outset of 2018, United Nations humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock described a humanitarian system “under strain” due to a record number of protracted crises across the Middle East and Africa — and a growing gap between requested and granted funding."

+ NGOs don't speak local languages, and that's a problem
New research suggests that most NGOs don't speak the languages of the places where they work.

The University of Reading's work, commissioned by The Conversation revealed that:

- Languages generally have a low priority in development, and are not resourced within NGOs
- Many development concepts that are essential to NGO work are not directly translatable into other languages (eg 'sustainability' and 'resilience')
- Lack of a local language can undermine trust in an NGO and the ability for locals to fully participate.

+ US cuts aid and puts conditions on billions

New rules applied by the Trump administration on money spent by USAid through the UN and other multinational agencies could negatively impact a quarter of all US foreign assistance.

The rule change, previously unreported, takes aim at USAID’s funding for Public International Organizations (PIOs), a category that includes UN agencies like UNICEF as well as the World Bank and the African Union, writes Samual Oakford in IRIN

"According to the new rules, any PIO grant over $5 million must now be vetted at the very top, in the office of USAID Administrator Mark Green. The threshold for Green to have to vet any other types of grant is $40 million. Former USAID officials say the low limit for PIOs will slow approval of UN financing, could create backlogs, and may leave funding more vulnerable to political interference."

"The move comes as Trump’s administration is cutting UN funding in Iraq to redirect it to Christians and other minorities, and as it announces a new religious freedom initiative. Green has been directed by US Vice-President Mike Pence to prioritise earmarking for such causes."

But the move could backfire.

Kori Schake, a former White House and State Department official, now deputy director-general at the International Institute for Strategic Studies said “It is breeding resentment...Targeting assistance and attention to Christian communities to the exclusion of their Muslim fellow citizens is ultimately bad for Christian communities and bad for American interests in the Middle East.”

+ PIANGO has a new Deputy Director

Long-time Tongan civil society leader Ms Emeline Siale Ilolahia Kolomotu’a joined PIANGO earlier this year taking up the new role to strengthen PIANGO's focus on its member countries in the region.

Siale will be well known to many CID members. She's whānau! CID congratulates her on the new role and we're excited to work with her and Director Emele Duituturaga, as the new Pacific Reset is defined and implemented.

In its 26-year history, PIANGO has served the Pacific through strengthening and building the capacity of the civil society and had been looking for an experienced, suitably-qualified and dynamic individual to fill the position.

That's Siale!

One of her first regional responsibilities is to lead the PIANGO preparations for the upcoming Nauru 49th Pacific Islands Forum Meeting.

Siale was previously the executive director of Civil Society Forum of Tonga before her appointment in Suva, holds a Masters in Business Administration from the University of the South Pacific, Graduate Diploma in Non-For-Profit Management from Unitec, New Zealand, and Graduate Diploma in Public Sector from Massey University, New Zealand.

+ Turns out Trump didn't change North Korea

Mounting evidence suggests that despite his self-professed dealmaking skills, Trump did not leave the historic summit with the decision he sought, says Ryan Hass of the Brookings Institute.

The 'agreement' was too vague, and as a result "North Korea reportedly has been upgrading nuclear and missile facilities, increasing production of fuel for nuclear bombs at secret sites, building new long-range missiles, and exploring ways to hide the extent of its nuclear weapons program from the United States."

Turns out North Korea doesn't want to exchange its nuclear and missile programs for a more prosperous future for its people after all.

+ India Floods
Flooding in the Eastern and North-Eastern parts of India has been caused by the worst monsoon rains in over century.

This year, the region has received 40 percent more rainfall than normal. Torrential rain over the past 10 days forced officials to release water from a significant number of full dams to prevent them bursting. Swelled rivers also caused landslides, the cause of a large number of the deaths recorded.

The area of India most critically affected was Kerala district, along with the neighbouring districts Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

It is reported that over 1 million people have been displaced and receiving assistance and shelter in over 3000 camps within the flood-hit districts.

As the waters are receding, access to those in need is increasing, with sanitation and disease prevention is the top priority, along with the retrieval of the deceased.

The Indian Red Cross Society currently put the death toll at over 500 individuals, with the number ultimately affected at over 1.5 million. Unfortunately at the time of writing, further rain is expected.

+ CID and Akina co-host Social enterprise panel

And for those who missed our excellent panel of social enterprise and NGOs working together and learning from each other, you can view it here.

This was co-hosted with ākina, the umbrella organisation for social enterprises in New Zealand.

CID will be producing a research paper based on this discussion.

Participants included:
Jackie Edmond, Family Planning NZ; Louise Aitken, ākina Foundation; Denise Arnold, Cambodia Charitable Trust; Bonnie Howland, Indigo&Iris; Eliza Raymond, GOOD Travel; and Michelia Miles, Trade Aid.

+ Member of the Moment: Save the Children NZ

Save the Children work on a range of projects, but the one we’re going to highlight this week is their Child-Centred Disaster Risk Reduction (CDRR) project in Fiji.

The CDRR project is a five-year programme co-funded with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. It focuses on national-level institutional strengthening, as well as helping communities, families and children to be better prepared for disasters while building their resilience to the future shocks they are likely to face: increasingly intense weather systems, drought, flooding, tsunami, temperature extremes, acidification of the ocean, and changing plant, animal and human diseases.

SCNZ’s approach centres on the active involvement of children. The disaster risk reduction and adaptation planning programmes are for children, and with children, recognising children’s needs, and building their knowledge about disaster management and climate adaptation, are important for increasing resilience.

One of the highlights of this two-year project has been the child DRR clubs established in SCNZ’s 30 high-risk communities.

These have proven to be an excellent forum for empowering children, while building awareness of key DRR messages to help keep children safe – and, through children’s stories and enthusiasm, parents became increasingly interested in DRR and are committing to reducing risks in their communities.

In some communities the project has brought together different social groups that had not interacted with each other before.

The DRR club members can now quite confidently explain how to reduce risks or what to do during different disasters.

The children are also involved in consultations on DRR national policy development and other DRR themes, which has been great for raising the public’s awareness – and has also provided an opportunity to engage some of SCNZ’s major local partners in this resilience effort, such as the National Disaster Management Office.

Building long-lasting resilience requires a multi-faceted approach and the CDRR project is aiming to bring children and youth into that process. The Save staff are true champions for DRR in Fiji and it’s heartening to see how much they have achieved in a short 2-year timeframe. To find out more about Save the Children and the great work they're doing, check out their website.

+ CID Talk: Compact for Young People in Humanitarian Action

Nancy Yuan, who is currently interning at Oxfam New Zealand spoke to us about the Compact for Young Humanitarian Action she is involved in.

You can watch the video here.

This talk got us at CID very excited.

If you are doing work on youth engagement within your organisation let us know. We would love to get our members together to share what they are doing and learn as much as possible from each other to tackle this important part of the future of our sector.

Meaningful and collaborative participation by youth can make all the difference in disaster response and development work. It is impossible for us to reach the Sustainable Development Goals without youth. UNFPA, along with IFRC, has published an initial report 'Igniting Hope', which covers the work of the Compact in its first 18 months, and presents some of the ways in which young people are engaging with each other and serving populations in need.

So let's get the conversation started!

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Pacific Islands Humanitarian