'Unseen' News and Views – By Baher Kamal & The Like
Syrian refugees are helping Lebanon to tackle a mounting garbage crisis. © UNHCR
Gharam is one of six Syrian refugee women who was offered their first ever paid job at Recycle Beirut – a year-old Lebanese recycling project that aims to contribute to solving the protracted waste crisis that has plagued Lebanon since 2015, and offer much-needed work opportunities for vulnerable Syrian refugees in the country.
– For those of us who ever feel conflicted about the United Nations, the past month has been an exercise in managing absurd cognitive dissonance. First, on October 21 2016, the United Nations announced that the 1940s comic book heroine, Wonder Woman would be its new mascot for promoting the empowerment of women and girls.
The news naturally sent serious women around the world into a collective swirl, and then a reach for their golden lassoes, to capture the attention of an institution that seems perpetually tone deaf on the issue of basic equality and respect for half the world’s population.
It also prompted female staff at the UN to protest in silence, through literally turning their backs on the occasion.
Then, on October 25th the UN Security Council held its annual open debate on the groundbreaking ‘Women, peace and security agenda’, now in its 16th year of existence – still full of promise, and yet barely realized. So what’s going on?
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 