Posts Tagged ‘Middle East’
An earthquake of 6.5 magnitude struck major parts of Balochistan, Pakistan including the provincial capital Quetta at 5.09 this morning. Several sizeable aftershocks have followed.
Reports on damage vary, with the BBC noting an estimated 160 dead.
Two CRS rapid assessment teams have been deployed and more information is expected tomorrow.
Coordination is taking place with the UN in Quetta, Caritas Pakistan, and a CRS rep is being sent to the Pakistan Humanitarian Forum for coordination at the capital level.
CRS staff in the Quetta office in the field are safe and accounted for.
CRS Pakistan has deployed key emergency field staff to the earthquake-affected areas. They will assess the level of destruction and determine the role that CRS can assume for humanitarian assistance.
In Quetta year-round, CRS supports education and vocational training programs for Afghan refugee women. Since 1951, CRS has provided emergency and long-term development programs in Pakistan. Today those programs include the strengthening and building of education, agriculture, livelihoods and water engineering in some of the most isolated, impoverished areas of the country.
In its head office in Islamabad and field offices in Muzaffarabad, Menserha, Bisham and Quetta, CRS employs 229 staff, more than 90 percent of whom are Pakistani. CRS has responded to some of country’s largest natural disasters in recent memory, including the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir and the 2007 Cyclone Yemin in Balochistan.
Posted
October 29th, 2008 in
Disaster, Emergency Response, Middle East by:
John Lindner |
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CRS Communications Coordinator Jennifer Hardy traveled with winners of the 2008 Egan Award for Journalistic Excellence . During their visit, they looked at the Church’s work with Iraqi refugees in Lebanon and Syria.
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Bishop Audo graciously arranged visits for Egan Award winners with Iraqi refugee families living in the northern city of Aleppo. Although the majority of Iraqi refugees are living in and around the capital of Damascus, Caritas is helping 800 Muslim and Christian Iraqi families in Aleppo.
After our meetings with the families, Bishop Audo took us to the roof of the church and explained the significance of the view – the church overlooks a neighboring mosque. The moment was especially poignant as the midday call to prayer began in the middle of his description of Christians and Muslims living together in peace in Syria.
Posted
October 21st, 2008 in
Middle East, Peace, Prayer, Religion by:
John Lindner |
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CRS Communications Coordinator Jennifer Hardy traveled with winners of the 2008 Egan Award for Journalistic Excellence . During their visit, they looked at the Church’s work with Iraqi refugees in Lebanon and Syria.
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On the first full day in Lebanon, bleary-eyed from jet lag and too little Turkish coffee, the Egan Award winners were delighted to visit Byblos, one of the oldest continually-inhabited cities in the world.
Our tour guide, Elie Lebboss, is an archeologist who speaks to groups between digs, and he took us to an ancient church just outside the old city’s walls. He agreed to share the Lord’s Prayer with us in Aramaic, the closest language to what Jesus actually spoke.
I closed my eyes for a few seconds while I recorded this clip (a big no-no for the professional videographers out there!) and let his words and the smell of the sea drift over my senses. Beautiful.
Posted
October 17th, 2008 in
Middle East by:
Catholic Relief Services |
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CRS Communications Coordinator Jennifer Hardy is traveling with winners of the 2008 Egan Award for Journalistic Excellence . They are seeing the Church’s work with Iraqi refugees in Lebanon and Syria.
On one of the Egan Award winners’ visits to see the work of Caritas Lebanon Migrant Center (CLMC), I was welcomed warmly to a confidential shelter for abused women who served as maids to Lebanese families. The demand for inexpensive household help leads women to potentially exploitative situations, and CLMC social workers told us many stories of physical abuse inflicted on servants by their employers.
I was honored to meet the women currently staying at the confidential shelter. They hail from places such as Ethiopia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka and follow several different faiths.
I spoke privately with Anna* from the Philippines. She had been locked in her employer’s home for approximately seven months before she found the opportunity to jump out of a third floor window to escape. She showed me burns from boiling water and an iron on her stomach, back and arms and said “My skin used to be so beautiful, but now I am embarrassed for my parents and husband to see me when I go home (to the Philippines).”
CLMC, with support from CRS, is providing a haven for her at the shelter until the legal case against her employer moves forward and she can return to her husband and small son in Manila. She spoke of her strong Catholic faith and when I asked how she found the courage to finally escape her employer, she answered “God…I could not have done it otherwise. I know and believe that God has a good future for me and my family.”
*Name has been changed.
Posted
October 14th, 2008 in
Advocacy, Middle East by:
John Lindner |
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Hussein, a 23-year-old man living in a volatile region of Lebanon, is part of CRS’ peacebuilding programs for youth. Photo by Laura Sheahen/CRS
“I hated what happened…we knew two guys who died in Beirut. I don’t feel safe any more. I am not even worried about my future but about what will happen tomorrow morning.”
These fearful words by a 24-year-old man about last May’s fighting in Lebanon underscore the tensions that threaten this fragile Middle Eastern country. There are more than a dozen political parties in Lebanon, 18 religious groups, and involvement from other countries who see Lebanon as key to advancing their own interests. Too often ordinary Lebanese feel powerless before their own political leaders and those of other countries.
Lebanon has been in the news a lot recently. In May, it chose a president after months of deadlock marked by assassinations and fighting. Last week, it named its government ministers after an 18-month standoff. This week, it exchanged prisoners with Israel, bringing some closure to the war of summer 2006. Everyone watching this complex, troubled land hopes it can overcome a decades-old legacy of violence.
With its peacebuilding programs, CRS is helping Lebanese communities to find common ground. In the south of Lebanon, where political and religious divisions among Shia, Sunni, and Christian groups have caused problems, CRS partners ask people from opposing factions to brainstorm projects everyone in a town can agree on. These “consensus building” programs focus on improvements like better water and electrical systems. In Minyeh, a poor town in the north of Lebanon, CRS works with local partner Na-am to teach young people in their 20s about good government. The young people ask their neighbors what would make their community better, and then work with town authorities and with each other to make it happen. Youth are having strong impact — in one town the adults have noted that the municipality picks up the trash more frequently now that the youth are more involved. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted
July 17th, 2008 in
Lebanon, Middle East, Peacebuilding by:
jrivera |
1 Comment »
On the seventh day of the Frontiers of Justice visit, the group visited Trade Aid, a fair trade association of basket weavers in Ghana. After spending three wonderful days in Navrongo meeting Catholic education officials and visiting high schools including the St. John’s Integrated Technical High School, one of three secondary schools for the deaf in Ghana where the deaf students gave a sign name to each member of our delegations we moved on to Bolgatanga where we visited Trade Aid, a fair trade association of basket weavers that works in partnership with A Greater Gift.
Here is Sinead Naughton’s reflection on the visit with the basket weavers of trade aid.
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Posted
July 14th, 2008 in
Middle East by:
Catholic Relief Services |
2 Comments »
Iraqi refugees in Lebanon may feel they’ve exchanged one war-torn country for another. Thousands of Iraqis who fled their homeland now live in poverty in Lebanon’s capital city of Beirut, where political tensions reached the boiling point last week.
Catholic Relief Services’ partner in Beirut, the Caritas Lebanon Migrant Center (CLMC), continues to help Iraqi refugees and other vulnerable people in Lebanon, such as Sri Lankan migrant workers. CLMC is the only Iraqi service-providing NGO to remain operational during this crisis.
Iraqis are feeling the economic effects of the fighting, although the areas where they live were not affected directly by fighting. Two hundred families were in line as of Monday morning to request food coupons and items like diapers. The Migrant Center has four facilities on standby if temporary shelter is necessary, with approximately 600 beds total.
“Iraqi refugees are showing signs of post-traumatic stress,” says Najla Chahda, director of the CLMC. “Some Iraqi refugees have expressed extreme fear, having already survived violence in Iraq and, in some cases, the July 2006 war in Lebanon. Their most urgent need now is food and non-food items, whose prices have risen dramatically since the fighting began on Wednesday.”
Posted
May 13th, 2008 in
Immigration and Migration, Middle East by:
jrivera |
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Two Iraqi refugee boys outside a social services center in Beirut, Lebanon. Photo by David Snyder/CRS
Representatives from Catholic Relief Services are participating today in a forum at the National Press Club in Washington that is highlighting the plight of the 2 milliion Iraqis who have been displaced by the war. CRS is co-sponsor of the event, Villanova Law Schools Ryan Forum on Law and Public Policy.
Many Iraqi refugees have fled to Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt, where they live as “illegal immigrants” and are unable to get jobs, schooling for their children or even basic medical care for their families. As they try to start new lives, they are forbidden to work in many cases, and shut out from services that citizens receive. These refugees wait out the days — hoping against hope that they’ll get visas to third countries.
Catholic Relief Services is working through our partners in the Middle East, like Caritas Lebanon, to provide food, medical care and help with rent to thousands of refugees. Mark Schnellbacher, our CRS Regional Director for the Middle East, and Najla Chadra of the Caritas Lebanon Migrant Center, participated in today’s panel.
CRS is also working to bring this issue to greater visibility here in the United States, particularly among American Catholics. Our CRS Advocacy staff has kept our grassroots legislative network informed on this issue and urged them to support appropriate legislation addressing the crisis. Earlier this year, CRS sponsored a delegation of eight women religious to Syria and Lebanon, where they saw first-hand the conditions in which these Iraqi refugees live and the challenges they face. They returned to the U.S. and mobilized to raise awareness of Iraqi refugees’ suffering, speaking in their congregations, universities and the media, as well as briefing members of Congress. And after speaking here today, Najla is scheduled to speak about the situation for Iraqis in Lebanon to several more groups in the Northeast.
Posted
April 4th, 2008 in
Immigration and Migration, Iraq, Lebanon, Middle East, refugees by:
jrivera |
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CRS joins with Caritas Internationalis in mourning the death of Archbishop Rahho of Mosul in northern Iraq. Archbishop Rahho was kidnapped last week and was found dead today. The following is a statement from Caritas Internationalis:
Caritas says the tragic death of Chaldean Catholic Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho of Mosul in northern Iraq highlights the urgency of ending the violence in the country and the region.
The archbishop was kidnapped on February 29 in Mosul after a deadly shootout in which three of his companions were killed. He was found dead on Thursday 13 March.
Caritas Internationalis, the umbrella organisation of 162 national Catholic charities that includes Caritas Iraq, said peacebuilding efforts need to be supported both within local communities, nationally and internationally to bring a halt to the conflict.
Caritas Iraq runs peacebuilding training courses in many places in the country, trying to break through distrust and suspicion among communities.
Caritas Internationalis Secretary General Lesley-Anne Knight said, “Archbishop Rahho was a man who sought peace and dialogue in a country at war. All sides of the conflict in Iraq have a duty not to target civilians. Archbishop Rahho supported peacebuilding efforts including those carried out by Caritas, which makes his death even more tragic and senseless. Caritas again calls for an end of all violence in Iraq and in the region, and for the safe release of all people taken hostage. Peace through dialogue is the only way forward.”
Caritas Iraq has been active since 1992 providing humanitarian relief, especially to new mothers and babies, and peacebuilding work since 2003.
Since 2003, CRS has been one of several Caritas Internationalis supporters of Caritas Iraq’s work with the internally displaced population and with those who have been marginalized within an increasingly desperate and violent situation.
Posted
March 13th, 2008 in
Iraq, Middle East, Peacebuilding by:
jrivera |
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Israel recently launched airstrikes on Gaza in retaliation for the Qassam (homemade) rockets that Gazan militants often fire into Israeli territory. Gazan civilians have suffered severe collateral damage. Omar Shaban, CRS’ Head of Office in Gaza, writes:
Omar Shaban, CRS’ Head of Office in Gaza. Photo by CRS
The situation is the Gaza Strip is unprecedented in terms of the level of suffering. Most of the victims are civilians; many houses were destroyed. When Israeli air fighters targeted Hamas’ buildings, which are empty, all the buildings in the area were severely damaged. There is no raw material available in the markets, no glass to repair the windows, no wood to repair the doors and kitchens, no tools and spare parts to repair the water and electricity networks which were damaged by the shelling. There is no fuel at all — very few cars and people are on the streets.
The entire area from the Erez crossing to Salah Din Road is under Israeli bombardment. People who live in these areas can not leave their homes. Journalists were not allowed to enter closely to these areas. Humanitarian organizations were allowed to enter into these areas only in the second day of the military operation.
Gaza’s hospitals are not able to cope with the huge number of casualties. Hospitals are treating people in the corridors because the ICUs are too small to cope with the number. Gaza City has become a dead city.
Posted
March 3rd, 2008 in
Gaza, Middle East by:
jrivera |
4 Comments »
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