Archive for ‘Middle East’

24/08/2024

Gaza: Vital Aid Supplies Running Low as Schools Hit in Further Strikes

Human Wrongs Watch

By Daniel Johnson

(UN News)* — UN aid teams have warned that vital chorine supplies that are essential for purifying water are running out and deteriorating in Gaza, while humanitarians condemned new strikes on schools sheltering people displaced by the war.

Families continue to shelter in school buildings in the Gaza Strip.
© UNRWA | Families continue to shelter in school buildings in the Gaza Strip.
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There are enough chlorine reserves to last just one month, said the UN aid coordination office, OCHA, while double the amount of purifying solution needs to be used to be effective now.
24/08/2024

Gaza: Latest Evacuation Orders Leave Civilians Dangerously Close to Frontline

Human Wrongs Watch

By Daniel Johnson in Geneva and Ziad Taleb in Gaza

“Continuous” Israeli military evacuation orders in Gaza threaten already extremely vulnerable people in the enclave with further forced displacement, raising concerns that vital services could soon be cut off, UN humanitarians warned on Wednesday [].

Ten months into the war, many Gazans continue to face the daily challenge of fetching clean water, amid repeated evacuation orders.
© WHO/Ahmed Zakot | Ten months into the war, many Gazans continue to face the daily challenge of fetching clean water, amid repeated evacuation orders.
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More than 10 months into the war in Gaza, sparked by Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel that left some 1,250 dead and more than 250 taken hostage, nearly all Gazans have been displaced at least once – and often multiple times – by repeated orders to evacuate and intense Israeli bombardment.
24/08/2024

Empowering Africa’s Informal Market Traders To Deliver Safe Food

Human Wrongs Watch

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Aug 13 2024 (IPS)* Local informal food markets feed millions of urbanites in bustling African cities, but the consequences of tainted food could be illness and death for unsuspecting consumers.
 
Fisherman Godknows Skota holds gutted and cleaned fish. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS

Fisherman Godknows Skota holds gutted and cleaned fish. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS

Over 130,000 people across Africa fall ill and die from consuming unsafe food, according to the World Health Organization (WHO)

An estimated 70 percent of Africa’s urban households buy food from informal markets, such as street vendors, kiosks, and traditional market sellers.

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24/08/2024

Hundreds of Modern Slavery Victims Locked Up in England’s Prisons

Human Wrongs Watch

By Sian Norris

Exclusive: New immigration laws create ‘hierarchy of victims’ that means many are imprisoned and denied help on release.

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Hundreds of modern slavery victims are in prison | Credit: Pexels/Composition by James Battershill

(OpenDemocracy)* 21 August 2024 — Hundreds of modern slavery victims may be being locked up in prisons across England and Wales, an exclusive investigation by openDemocracy can reveal.

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23/08/2024

The Escalating Conflict in the Sahel: A Geopolitical Quagmire

Human Wrongs Watch

By Raïs Neza Boneza – TRANSCEND Media Service*

The Sahel, this vast arid region stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea, a region that has long been a battleground for various forces, shows no signs of abating.

Instead, it is intensifying, drawing in both regional and global powers in a struggle that is as much about resources as it is about ideology and control.

Raïs Neza Boneza

The events surrounding the recent ambush of Malian forces on 25 Jul 2024, near Tinsawaten, on the Mali-Algeria border, underscore the complexity and the scale of this conflict.

The Tinsawaten Ambush: A Turning Point?

The ambush on Malian forces at Tinsawaten, a strategic locality straddling the Mali-Algeria border, marks a significant escalation in the conflict.

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23/08/2024

Botswana Prepares for Historic UN Conference on Landlocked Countries

Human Wrongs Watch

()* — Leaders from landlocked developing countries, (LLDCs) will gather in Gaborone, Botswana, this December to tackle challenges, explore solutions, and build alliances for a more equitable and prosperous future.

Men unload sacks of onions from a truck in Bamako, Mali, a landlocked developing country. Their lack of direct access to the vital trade links often result in landlocked countries paying high transport and transit costs.
World Bank/Dominic Chavez | Men unload sacks of onions from a truck in Bamako, Mali, a landlocked developing country. Their lack of direct access to the vital trade links often result in landlocked countries paying high transport and transit costs.
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At the Third UN Conference on Landlocked Developing Countries, known as LLDC3, innovative solutions and strategic partnerships will be outlined and leveraged to “unlock the full potential of these nations.” LLDC3 is set to take place from 10-13 December.
 
Here’s what you need to know about LLDCs and plans for this year’s conference:
22/08/2024

Mpox: What You Need to Know about the Latest Public Health Emergency

Human Wrongs Watch

By Eileen Travers

(UN News)* — The swift spread of a new virulent strain of the mpox virus across Africa triggered the World Health Organization (WHO) to declare it once again a public health emergency of international concern last week.

WHO is scaling up response to curb a growing mpox outbreak in the African region.
© WHO/Katson Maliro | WHO is scaling up response to curb a growing mpox outbreak in the African region.
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But, what is it, where did it come from and how can the world deal with the threat, which inevitably raises the spectre of pandemics past such as COVID-19 and the early spread of HIV infections?

Here’s what you need to know:

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21/08/2024

World Humanitarian Day: ‘In Gaza, we can’t imagine tomorrow’

Human Wrongs Watch

By WFP Editorial Team*

World Food Programme (WFP)‘ staff on the challenges of working in the most testing circumstances.
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War-displaced Gazans on the move yet again, arriving in Khan Younis from the southern city of Rafah. Photo: WFP/Ali Jadallah
War-displaced Gazans on the move yet again, arriving in Khan Younis from the southern city of Rafah. Photo: WFP/Ali Jadallah  

Windows shattered by nearby airstrikes. Children crying out from conflict’s psychological blowback. The sense of a hangman’s noose growing ever tighter.

These are some of the stories shared by World Food Programme Gaza employees. Like for hundreds of thousands of fellow Palestinians on the Strip, there is no escaping the 10-month-old war.

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21/08/2024

Biden’s Convention Speech Made Absurd Claims About His Gaza Policy

Human Wrongs Watch

SAN FRANCISCO, USA, Aug 21 2024 (IPS)* An observation from George Orwell — “those who control the present, control the past and those who control the past control the future” — is acutely relevant to how President Biden talked about Gaza during his speech at the Democratic convention Monday night.
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A UN team inspects an unexploded 1,000-pound bomb lying on a main road in Khan Younis. Credit: OCHA/Themba Linden

His words fit into a messaging template now in its eleventh month, depicting the U.S. government as tirelessly seeking peace, while supplying the weapons and bombs that have enabled Israel’s continual slaughter of civilians.

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21/08/2024

Existential Struggle

Human Wrongs Watch

By Mazin Qumsiyeh | Popular Resistance – TRANSCEND Media Service*

15 Aug 2024 – Now the numbers killed in the indiscriminate slaughter in Gaza exceeded 40,000 registered deaths (72% of them women and children). But the number of deaths could be many folds more (at least ten thousand under the rubble, many thousands died for lack of food or medical care etc).

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Gaza under intense, relentless Israeli bombardment Aug 2024. Photo: Mazin Qumsiyeh

But globally the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. How do they do it and how do we stop it.

First simple facts:

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