Africa

The Confederation of African Football (Caf) says it is using the suspension of football due to the coronavirus pandemic to complete outstanding payments for match officials.

By Dorothy Tembo
GENEVA, Apr 10 2020 (IPS)

With the novel coronavirus COVID-19 having reached the African continent, countries are getting ready to manage the spread of the virus and ensure that their fragile health systems can cope. Images from China and Europe give many reasons for concern.

In addition to the health challenges posed by COVID-19, Africa is already feeling the effect on its economies. With industries shutting down in Asia, America and Europe demand for raw materials and commodities is declining, but it is also hampering Africa’s access to industrial components and manufactured goods (including medical equipment).

Initial actions in Africa have focused on slowing viral contagion with measures, including the closing of borders. These actions come as the continent has been making bold moves to increase economic integration, with African Union officials recently swearing in the first-ever Secretary-General of the newly created Secretariat of the African Free Continental Free Trade Agreement.

The coronavirus could represent a risk for the continental project but leaders could also turn it into an opportunity for stronger collaboration. If leaders fast-track specific policies, it may also represent an opportunity if certain policies are fast-tracked. Quick gains could be achieved by consolidating the regional integration initiatives they are already implementing.

The closing of borders, for instance, can send a very different signal depending on how governments do it. Where leaders of neighbouring nations close borders together, as those of Portugal and Spain have done, it is a symbol of partnership in the fight against a pandemic.

Reducing flows of people while keeping borders open for goods signals continued faith in the importance of economic activities and trade in providing the goods people need to continue their daily lives. In Africa, such collaboration will be crucial, especially for the continent’s sixteen landlocked countries.

The crisis may also provide African leaders with an opportunity to look at regional value chains differently. Reliable regional supply chains characterize North America, Asia and Europe.

In Africa, however, integration in international markets mostly entails integration in global, not regional, value chains – with Africa providing the raw products for processing elsewhere around the world.

Dorothy Tembo

Opportunities for creating regional value chains exist, notably for making motor vehicles or in aerospace activities in Northern Africa. But designing regional strategies may mean agreeing on which component of the value chain is produced where, and can involve trade-offs that policymakers do not always find it easy to make.

But the exceptional nature of the pandemic could provide fertile ground for regional collaboration by policymakers in the fields of pharmaceuticals, disinfectants, diagnostic testing equipment or protective garments. Such decisions will have to be taken and implemented very rapidly.

African leaders can also act in unison in the fight against the economic consequences of the pandemic. Nobody knows how much the pandemic will affect global GDP, but any impact is sure to be significant.

Estimated losses in GDP growth for the world as a whole – but also for Africa as a region – currently hover around between 1.5 and 2 percentage points. Those figures are most likely to be revised to include even greater losses.

The travel industry has been the first to be impacted. Airlines around the world are struggling, and tourism has been hit hard. The blow will not go unnoticed in African countries like Tunisia, Egypt and Kenya – where tourism represents around 14%, 11% and 10% of GDP respectively. For underperforming regional airlines, this could spell disaster.

Shutdowns in China and Europe, notably in the apparel, machinery and footwear subsectors, will significantly hit global supply chains – with consequences for Africa. Traditionally reliable sectors in Africa – like the cut flower industry – could also take a pummeling.

In countries that impose lockdowns, large parts of the services sectors are likely to suffer dire outcomes. The hospitality, sports and recreation sectors, and large parts of retailing, are among those most affected by partial or full lockdowns.

The drastic drop in oil prices – triggered by events independent of the coronavirus pandemic but now reinforced by the negative demand resulting from it – is set to compound these economic shocks. Oil exporters like Nigeria will see their revenues shrink.

Rwanda’s e-commerce booms as the first E-commerce Service Centre sets up in Kigali, bringing Rwandan businesses to domestic and international markets with minimal investment and risk. Credit: ITU

Faced with this outlook, African policymakers may want to ask themselves how long businesses in their countries can survive in the absence of or with significantly reduced revenues and what the scale of job losses may be.

For many micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), with fewer assets to ride out the storm, the survival rate may only be counted in weeks. That is why small businesses, more than larger businesses, will tend to go out of business or cripple their capacity to be competitive.Yet, because MSMEs employ around 70% of the workforce in most countries, shedding workers will only aggravate the economic downturn brought on by the pandemic.

Knowing how small businesses act as a lynchpin connecting the pandemic to a broader economic recession, governments around the world have scrambled to reduce the operational stresses on them.

They have introduced policies meant to help MSMEs cope with short-term financial risks and long-term business implications. This will, it is hoped, reduce layoffs, prevent bankruptcy, encourage investment and help economies get back on their feet as soon as possible.

These measures include concessional financing; tax reductions and grants; employment incentives; technical assistance; and indirect measures.

Low-interest loans and other concessional financing, aimed at easing short-term liquidity issues, have been among the most popular policy measures announced to date. But the experience of the 1970s oil price shock shows that this can have a limited impact in the supply-shock, low-interest rate environments that exist today.

Instead, the most effective way to prevent bankruptcies may be measures aimed at reducing costs for MSMEs – such as tax breaks. Investment in digital trade and investment facilitation must also continue – countries with such facilitating policies will be first off the mark in the post-crisis period.

All of these measures require funding. Countries with fiscal space will find it easier to introduce them than those without it. Unfortunately, global debt levels have continued to increase after the financial crisis over a decade ago.

Though the bulk of global debt is held by the industrialized world, its increase has been more important in the developing world over the past decade. Concerted action among leaders may therefore be necessary in order for efforts to support small and medium sized businesses not to have negative repercussions on financial markets.

History shows us that cross-border collaborations often arise during or after significant crises. The First World War prompted the creation of the International Labour Office; the United Nations was formed in the aftermath of the Second World War. The construction of the European Union was also a reaction to that conflagration.

The African Union has already recognized that Africa will be stronger if countries are more integrated and unified with the birth of the African Continental Free Trade Area. A similarly strong commitment to joint action by leaders on the continent would undoubtedly benefit the fight against the coronavirus pandemic and its economic consequences for Africa.

These actions should include a recommitment to the Sustainable Development Goals, to multilateralism and a pledge to help those that will be most affected by the economic downturn: small businesses, women, young people and vulnerable communities.

The International Trade Centre (ITC) with its mandate to build the competitiveness of small businesses in developing countries, emphasizing women-owned businesses and people at the base of the economic pyramid, stands ready to support these efforts.

The post The Cost of Coronavirus in Africa: What Measures can Leaders Take? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Dorothy Tembo is Executive Director ad interim, International Trade Centre (ITC)

The post The Cost of Coronavirus in Africa: What Measures can Leaders Take? appeared first on Inter Press Service.

A selection of the best photos from across the continent this week.

South Africa sees an unexpected slow-down in the daily rate of infections, writes Andrew Harding.

Fears are growing that gorillas, orangutans and others apes could contract the virus.

By PRESS RELEASE
NAIROBI, Kenya, Apr 9 2020 (IPS-Partners)

The Government of Kenya, the United Nations and humanitarian partners have launched today a Flash Appeal requesting $267.5 million to respond to the most immediate and critical needs of10.1 millionpeople.

Cabinet Secretary for National Treasury and Planning, UkurYataniKanacho, said: “When times are challenging you get to know your friends better. I would like to commend the Kenya United Nations Country Team and humanitarian partners for being real friends and fighting with us shoulder to shoulder as we fight this deadly pandemic”.

The Appeal is seeking to mobilize emergency funding for UN agencies and NGOs to complement the Government’s preparedness and response efforts for the next six months. The funds will be used to support public health responses to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic in the country and provide targeted humanitarian assistance and protection to the most vulnerable and at-risk communities

From the current UN Development Assistance Framework to Kenya 2018-20, the UN family has redeployed US$ 45 million to support Kenya in its response to the COVID 19 pandemic. The UN has also deployed over 70 staff and volunteers to assist the Government of Kenya.

Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Devolution and ASAL, Eugene Wamalwa, said during the launch: “This Flash Appeal is much appreciated.Coming on the heels of several natural disasters since 2016 this appeal aims to bring humanitarian relief at a time where we are all stretched to the limit fighting COVID-19”

The COVID-19 outbreak in Kenya is occurring in a context of significant chronic vulnerabilities as well as increased humanitarian needs as a result of back-to back droughts, ongoing floods and a locust upsurge.

“We believe Kenya is at an important tipping point and that together we can move this into the right direction. We are confident that together we can flatten the COVID-19 curve and diminish thethreat in Kenya while continuing to strengthen our health systems, and economy. We thank the UN and all our partners for their support,”Chief Administrative Secretary for Health Dr Rashid Aman said.

The UN and NGO partners response is focused towards saving lives and preventing loss of livelihoods.

In addition to the immediate and direct public health emergency response, the Flash Appeal has prioritized the continue delivery of basic essential services as well as the protection of livelihood assets and food support to the most vulnerable communities.The response is about ensuring access to essential health care, education, protection, services for women children and vulnerable communities,including people with HIV, displaced populations, people in high concentration areas in urban and peri-urban areas, refugees, and people affected by floods and the locust upsurge.

“We will stand in full solidarity with the Government and people of Kenya in the fight against COVID 19,”said the UN Resident Coordinator in Kenya, Siddharth Chatterjee. “This Flash Appeal is a clear expression of our solidarity as we mobilize support to accelerate our COVID-19 response in Kenya in lockstep with the Government,” he added.

The continuity of humanitarian operations will be critical and would rely on the Government’s support to facilitate internal movement of humanitarian supplies and workers in case of a lockdown; facilitate the operation of humanitarian flights between Nairobi and the refugee camps and vulnerable communities; fast-track and facilitate custom procedures to bring in relief supplies ; and facilitate humanitarian access to particularly vulnerable hotspot areas including refugee camps and urban settlements.

The humanitarian community will comply strictly to the regulations put in place by the Government to contain the spread of COVID-19 and only personnel who have complied with quarantine requirements and are trained in safe/physical distancing and equipped with personal protective equipment (PPE) will be deployed.

The post Un and Partners Request $267.5 Million to Respond to Humanitarian Needs Arising from COVID-19 Pandemic in Kenya appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Jan Lundius
STOCKHOLM / ROME, Apr 9 2020 (IPS)

The Coronavirus, COVID-19, makes its deadly round across the world. People fall sick and die, communities and entire nations end up in its deadly grip and try to cope with it. Everything is changing, and changing fast and we all have to deal with it together, even if many of us are being physically apart. Humans are social beings. Our mental and physical capacities are created around that fact and crave for support and compassion.

Some of us benefit from social security, relative wealth, access to health care and a home of our own, others lack all of this. COVID-19 brings already existing social ills and inequalities to the surface. The general and the personal are getting mixed up. A collective state of mind becomes part of our intimate sphere of existence. While an imposed quarantine isolates us from others, we become subjects to conflicting information, wild rumours, and apocalyptic prophesies, combined with an awareness of the injustice of unequal suffering and worries about what the future might hold in store. What happens to our bodies affect our minds, and vice versa. We might feel as we are awake within a nightmare, a state of mind that has been described by several imaginative authors.

In Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Year of Solitude the plague comes to the small town of Maconde, which in Márquez’s novel serves as an archetype for countless other Latin American rural towns. However, this plague is not a plague of the body, but of the mind. It makes it impossible for people to sleep and accordingly it also makes them unable to dream. As the plague extends and ultimately affects everyone in Maconde, people do not starve because they can work day and night. They do not suffer since they cannot dream and have thus lost their ability to imagine another existence. To save other communities from the ”illness of insomnia”, the town’s most influential leader, José Arcadio Buendía, decides that it has to be restricted ”to the perimeter of the town. So effective was the quarantine that the day came when the emergency situation was accepted as a natural thing and life was organized in such a way that work picked up its rhythm again.”1 However, at its final stage the plague proves to be deadly. The victims soon lose their memory, their sense of reality and worst of all – their compassion.

One of the lessons learned from this fable might be that we humans cannot subsist without our dreams, hopes and imagination. Furthermore, we all depend on one another. The weak on the strong, the old on the young, and the entire humanity depends on a natural environment we have abused in a horrifying manner.

The imposed quarantine many of us are subject to might hopefully remind us about differences between the rich and the poor – that wealth and class are always an issue and might determine our ability to cope with the pandemic. A Brazilian story may illustrate this fact:

The first death from COVID-19 in Rio de Janeiro was a domestic worker who tried to get treatment for her breathing problems. However, she was sent back home unattended. When her health deteriorated further and she on the 16th of March returned for treatment, she told the hospital staff that her employer had become ill after returning from Italy. It was found that he had been suspected of being infected by the Coronavirus, something he had not told his employee. He had early on been hospitalized and tested positive. His 63-year-old employee died the day after she was admitted to a hospital.2

Similar cases have occurred in other areas of Latin America and the Caribbean, where maids, gardeners, drivers, nurses, hotel staff and other people in the service sector have by employers and clients been infected with COVID-19. This have made several Latin Americans inclined to label COVID-19 as a ”rich man’s disease”. Many of the original COVID-19 cases have been people returning from visits to Spain, or Italy, as well as tourists coming from these countries, or businessmen returning from trips to other European countries, or China. Such patients have generally received excellent and expensive care, while poorer victims of COVID-19 who caught their infection from them have often been left unattended and furthermore forced to suffer the disease under conditions of poor housing, insecure income and deficient, or non-existent health care. Similar stories are told from other parts of the world, where we also witness how migrant workers are desperately trying to return to their homes to avoid becoming locked-in within huge cities, far away from their loved ones. How citizens in war-torn areas of Libya, Yemen, Afghanistan and Syria now are further threatened by the pandemic, as well as the homeless refugees amassed and stuck in camps in border areas of Turkey and Bangladesh. Medical doctors are warning that once the pandemic is spreading from wealthy regions and privileged social classes into poorer strata of society, issues of quarantine, loss of income and inadequate healthcare are going to be paramount and insurmountable for poor nations.

Like the people trapped in Maconde many of those quarantined within affluent societies may be affected by a loss of their sense of reality, while becoming numbed by figures and statistics. Living in wealthy nations and/or secluded within upscale neighbourhoods may make them forget the plight of the less fortunate.

Let us hope that this pandemic will serve as a reminder that we all share this earth and it is our common interest to take care of it together. That many of us might come out of our quarantine with an improved, more compassionate view of the world and our fellow human beings. That this global affliction makes us realize that the best way to mitigate future disasters is to preserve our natural resources in a sustainable manner and guarantee equal education and healthcare for all. This can be done and for our own survival we have to achieve it.

1 García Márquez, Gabriel (1978) One Hundred Years of Solitude. London: Picador, p. 45.
2 https://apublica.org/2020/03/primeira-morte-do-rio-por-coronavirus-domestica-nao-foi-informada-de-risco-de-contagio-pela-patroa/

Jan Lundius holds a PhD. on History of Religion from Lund University and has served as a development expert, researcher and advisor at SIDA, UNESCO, FAO and other international organisations.

The post COVID-19 and Hope for a Compassionate Future appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Taiwan rejects accusations by the UN health body's head that racist slurs against him originated there.

The region's economy will shrink for the first time in 25 years because of the coronavirus, the bank predicts.

By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
SYDNEY and KUALA LUMPUR, Apr 9 2020 (IPS)

Within weeks, the Covid-19 epidemic was classified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as an epidemic of international significance, triggering a pre-agreed WHO response. By the end of the first week of April, more than 1.3 million people had been confirmed as infected, with over 65,000 deaths across the world.

Anis Chowdhury

Many governments of developing, especially poor countries are unsure what to do, fearing the likely economic consequences of the ‘lockdowns’ increasingly adopted by Western economies. Indeed, lockdowns may shut down businesses relying on daily turnover and eliminate incomes for daily rated workers.

Meanwhile, most East Asian and some other governments have acted early to trace, test, isolate and treat the infected without lockdowns. Yet, most measures recommended have been criticized as beyond the means of the most vulnerable societies and populations.

Early action crucial
Early measures have required ‘physical distancing’ and other precautionary measures — at work, at home and in the community, at relatively low cost. People also need to be prepared to live differently for a long time to come as part of a ‘new normal’, at least until everyone can be effectively vaccinated.

‘All of government’ approaches are urgently needed everywhere to provide effective leadership to ‘whole of society’ efforts to contain the spread of viral infections. While this is no conventional war, only whole of society mobilization efforts can help mitigate major economic disruption and damage.

This should not only involve public health and police authorities, typically those empowered by draconian lockdowns. But repressive measures are unlikely to secure needed public support for effective enforcement and implementation, and adoption of needed behavioural and cultural changes.

Health authorities must provide publics with much better understanding of the threats faced and the rationale for policy responses to secure compliance. Public appreciation of the challenges involved is crucial for policy compliance and effective implementation.

Physical distancing, social solidarity
Kerala state in southwestern India, with a population of 35 million, has become “a model state in the fight against Covid-19”. Its Left Front-led government was among the first to introduce precautionary state-wide measures against the novel coronavirus threat.

Through appropriate and effective early actions, it has successfully slowed the spread of infection in the state, largely by promoting physical distancing and mainly sanitary precautionary, measures, and providing better protection for health staff well before the hugely disruptive and draconian lockdown imposed in India in late March.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

The Kerala state government invited religious leaders, local bodies and civil society organizations to participate in policy design and implementation, considering its specific socio-economic conditions, including urban slum environments.

It has communicated effectively in different languages to educate all, including migrants, and to prevent stigmatization of those infected, even opposing the term ‘social distancing’, which has caste connotations, with ‘physical distancing and social solidarity’.

Returning migrants
Despite Kerala’s long-standing achievements in education, health and science, highly educated Keralans tend to migrate to work out of state, if not abroad, seeking more lucrative employment. The state was still recovering from the devastating floods and nipah virus epidemic of 2018 when tens of thousands began returning after losing jobs in the Middle East.

Kerala is also the destination for a large number of Indian internal migrants. With the nationwide lockdown, non-residents, equivalent to almost 5% of Kerala’s population, have returned, causing a surge of new infections.

Such unusually high movements of people have made the state more vulnerable. Despite some controversy, the state appears to have handled the migrant issue very well, especially compared to other state governments and the central government.

There has also been a close connection between Kerala and Wuhan, a popular educational hub offering affordable quality medical and other courses; the first three positive Covid-19 cases detected in India involved returned university students in Wuhan.

The state health department promptly went into action, setting up a coordination centre on 26 January. Recognizing there was no time to be lost, the Kerala state government set up mechanisms to identify, test, isolate and treat those infected, quickly earning an excellent reputation.

Less disruptive, less costly, more effective
Some key features of Kerala’s response, undertaken by a government with very limited fiscal resources, are hence instructive.

*All-of-government approach: involving a range of relevant state government ministries and agencies to design measures to improve consistency, coordination and communication, and to avoid confusion.

*Whole-of-society approach: wide community consultations, including experts, to find the most locally appropriate modes of limiting infections, along with means to monitor and enforce them.

*Social mobilization: communities were provided essential epidemiological information to understand the threat and related issues, ensure compliance with prescribed precautionary measures, and avoid panic.

*No one left behind: adequate supply of essential commodities, particularly food and medicines, has been ensured, especially to protect the most vulnerable sections of society.

To make things worse, Kerala has been discriminated against by the central government’s disaster relief fund on specious grounds. The largely agricultural state has modest fiscal resources of its own as state governments in India have limited fiscal rights and resources.

Credible leadership
The Kerala government has set up 18 committees and holds daily evening meetings to evaluate the situation, issuing media updates about those quarantined, tested and hospitalized .

At these meetings, the state Health Minister and Chief Minister calmly explain what is going on, including what the government is doing. They thus provide credible leadership on the difficult issues involved, securing strong public participation for its mass campaign of containment.

Kerala’s approach has proven less disruptive, less costly and more effective than most others. After recording its first COVID-19 case on January 30, its infection and death rates have been kept relatively low despite much more tracing and testing.

The post Kerala Covid-19 Response Model for Emulation appeared first on Inter Press Service.

A graphic shared in Hashim's #AgirContreCOVID19 Twitter Chat to stop misinformation.

By External Source
Apr 9 2020 (IPS-Partners)

As the world grapples with unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, young people are demonstrating their continued leadership in their communities and countries. According to a new UN plan to address COVID-19, young people are some of the most affected by the pandemic’s socio-economic impacts. Nevertheless, youth are also among the most active in global responses: Not only are they on the frontlines as health workers, but they are also advancing health and safety in their roles as researchers, activists, innovators, and communicators. As such, decision-makers must commit to ensuring youth voices are part of the solutions for a healthier, safer, and gender-equal world.

Here are just some of the ways that Women Deliver Young Leaders are stepping up and taking action against the outbreak:

1. Providing essential reproductive health services and companionship

With many countries going into some form of lockdown, women around the world are having trouble accessing safe abortion and contraception. To ensure people are still able to care for their sexual and reproductive health, Lina López and her organization, safe2choose, are offering support via email, website, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. “During these uncertain times, we remain committed to provide safe abortion information and counseling to women and girls from their homes,” Lina said. “Talk to us, we are here to support you.”

In Israel, welfare social worker Or Ram and in the UK, NHS Volunteer Responder Gbemisola Osadua offer telephone support to those experiencing loneliness while in self-isolation. Or also counsels girls with unwanted pregnancies, highlighting the cross-cutting work of social workers during this time of quarantine and other protective measures.

2. Using social media and apps to spread accurate information

According to medical doctor Hashim Hounkpatin of Benin, there are two diseases currently spreading around the world in a viral manner: COVID-19 and fake news. The vaccine for both? “Good information.” Hashim, who launched a mass literacy program in Francophone Africa called Arayaa, teamed up with a consortium of health-related content producers to organize a Tweetchat about how to keep safe against COVID-19. Their hashtag #AgirContreCOVID19 has reached more than 90,000 participants to date. Additionally, they are designing an app that displays trusted knowledge in local languages and allows users to interact directly with experts for help.

3. Speaking out for effective and equitable care

On top of treating patients, young doctors are also responding by sounding the alarm bells around limited resources and demanding greater investments in health. Sujitha Selvarajah of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) emphasizes the need for personal protective equipment (PPE), increased testing capacity, and protection of the most vulnerable populations. “This pandemic reveals the existing inequalities in society,” Sujitha said. “Protecting the most vulnerable should be a priority at all times, not just during a pandemic.”

Sujitha Selvarajah’s medical team appeals the public to stay home and protect others.

Meanwhile, Gvantsa Khizanishvili of Georgia is focused on improving access to quality and equitable care for cancer patients during the pandemic. As the Tbilisi City Manager of C/Can, Gvantsa is calling for oncologists around the world to share information and data on the impact of COVID-19 on cancer patients. Because cancer patients are at higher risk of complications from the virus, she believes “it is crucial to provide the most accurate information, resources and support to people with cancer, cancer survivors, their families, and caregivers.”

4. Championing mental wellness

Protecting everyone from the pandemic also means safeguarding people’s mental health. In Poland, physician and psychiatry resident Anna Szczegielniak is bringing attention to how social isolation puts additional stress on individuals, especially those who are homeless, have no internet connectivity, or lack support from their families. According to Anna, physicians in the country are organizing social media groups for those in crisis and are highlighting the value of community. “Only united we can beat this pandemic,” Anna said.

5. Innovating to improve access to lifesaving testing

Widespread testing is a vital part of saving lives in a pandemic. To bolster their city’s coronavirus defense, Helena Likaj developed and implemented a drive-thru testing center in New Orleans, Louisiana. Every weekday afternoon and while supplies last, their facility provides free COVID-19 testing to individuals riding up in cars and bicycles.

Helena Likaj conducts drive-thru testing.

6. Conducting research and developing technology

Another critical aspect of combatting coronavirus is research. Hamza Meghari of Palestine, a Clinical Care Research Assistant currently based in the UK, is joining forces with the World Health Organization to conduct a study of the clinical and epidemiological characteristics of COVID-19. This research would enable better understanding of the disease and therefore improved management of its symptoms and spread. While things may be uncertain now, “we should all believe in the power of scientific research,” Hamza said.

Hamza Meghari prepares materials for his research.

7. Harnessing the strength of communications

Jama Jack is the Head of Communications of the Medical Research Council Unit for the only COVID-19 testing center in The Gambia. For her, one of the biggest local challenges is the information gap, so she created posters and videos busting myths about coronavirus and published the materials in various Gambian languages. “Solidarity will provide an opportunity for the sharing of correct information, and this can help to minimize the potential for panic,” Jama said.

Similarly, editor, producer, and presenter Robert Mukondiwa provides daily updates to Zimbabweans (and the rest of the world) about his country’s efforts to tackle COVID-19. Through informative programming at Zimpapers TV Network, Robert is influencing others to engage in helpful behavior changes such as social distancing and self-isolation.

Jama Jack demonstrates good hygiene next to a poster she created.

Robert Mukondiwa at Zimpapers TV Network.

8. Delivering food and sanitation

In a time when essentials are scarce, young activists are working to fill the needs of their communities. Community Development for Peace (CDP) founder Muhammad Ferdaus works through his organization to distribute dry food and sanitation kits to daily laborers — such as street vendors and rickshaw pullers — in Bangladesh. Since Dhaka’s lockdown has made maintaining health and safety especially difficult in the slum area of Korail, Muhammad gives these residents hygiene products and provides training on how to keep their surroundings clean.

Social activist Krishna Maheshwari is also providing free meals to families in Pakistan. His self-initiated service prioritizes single women and widows, as well as workers whose livelihoods have been disrupted by the crisis.

Community Development for Peace prepares food donations.

Bags of food packed by Krishna Maheshwari.

9. Engaging elected officials and lawmakers

As a lawyer, Bernarda Ordóñez Moscoso used her role as legal advisor at the National Assembly of Ecuador to secure funding for COVID-19 response. After Bernarda urged political parties to donate money they had set aside for election campaigning, the President of Ecuador announced that the government would channel these reserves into fighting the pandemic. Often, violence against girls and women tends to skyrocket in times of crisis. In response, Bernarda is also helping implement a protocol to address the safety of girls and women during the emergency.

10. Ensuring the most vulnerable are not left behind

Several reports show that those in humanitarian settings, particularly groups who are displaced and/or living in camps, may experience the direst effects of COVID-19. Young people like Muzna Dureid are raising their voices to make sure these populations don’t get left behind in the crisis. As Liason Officer at White Helmets, a volunteer organization that has gained international attention for rescuing wounded civilians during Syria’s civil war, Muzna advocates for a “global effort of expertise, technology, money, and materials to save lives everywhere, including in Syria,” where crowded refugee settlements leave girls and women especially vulnerable to the disease. “The ceasefire is the only way to deliver medical products,” Muzna said.

White Helmets sterilizing schools, mosques, and other public places.

To read more about how Women Deliver Young Leaders and other youth around the world are affected by this pandemic and how they are responding, please visit our Youth Deliver channels on Twitter and Facebook.

For resources on how to effectively engage with young people in your work, check out Women Deliver’s paper on Meaningful Youth Engagement.

Learn more about Women Deliver’s response here.

All photos courtesy of Women Deliver Young Leaders.

The post 10 Ways Young People are Leading the Way Against COVID-19 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Women Deliver Young Leaders perform vital work on the frontlines of the pandemic response

The post 10 Ways Young People are Leading the Way Against COVID-19 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Fairuz Ahmed
NEW YORK, Apr 9 2020 (IPS)

For a Bangladeshi woman, who has worked as a sex worker since childhood, her future post-COVID-19 looks hopeless.

Shilpy, who works at Daulatdia, the largest brothel in the country, told IPS how she now also fears for the future of her two daughters.

“When I was born, the woman my mother worked for gave everyone rice pudding as a celebration. This is not a place for male children, only females are valued,” she says, adding that when her mother died, she wasn’t given a proper burial. Shilpy soon found herself involved in the sex industry.

“I think I was around six years old when I learned to dance, put makeup on and taught other traits profitable for the business. I was sold after a few years,” Shilpy says.

Sex work is legal in Bangladesh for women aged 18 or older, although new sex workers are often much younger. Many of them are sold into sex work for about $250 which the women need to repay to their handlers, usually older women, known as ‘madams’.

The sex workers’ rights were confirmed in 2014. The Bangladesh National Women Lawyers Association convinced the High Court the eviction of the sex workers from another large brothel, Kandapara, was illegal. This decision was welcomed as girls born in a brothel or belonging to a sex-worker are shunned by society and have no place to go.

However, the COVID-19 pandemic and social distancing protocols to prevent the diseases spread resulted in the closure of brothels.

The World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11, 2020, characterised the Coronavirus/COVID-19 disease as a pandemic and called for a comprehensive, all-of-society strategy to prevent infections from saving lives and minimising the impact. Following the global outbreak, the Bangladesh government ordered a shutdown of all businesses, including brothels until at least April 14.

The sex workers have accepted the government order because it is a serious health issue.

Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of UN Women, in March commented the pandemic had shifted the way we work and live. She noted women’s unique role in this.

“One thing is clear about the COVID-19 pandemic, as stock markets tumble, schools and universities close, people stockpile supplies and home becomes a different and crowded space: this is not just a health issue.

“It is a profound shock to our societies and economies, exposing the deficiencies of public and private arrangements that currently function only if women play multiple and underpaid roles,” Mlambo-Ngcuka said.

Sex workers are one of the categories of women profoundly affected by international shutdowns.

The Bangladesh government promised to give all of the sex workers a package of 30 kgs of rice, $25, and a freeze on rent during the lockdown. But this is little comfort to the more than 3500 sex workers at the brothels which were frequented by 8000 customers a day.

For Shilpy, the lockdown is devastating. A few years ago, a local NGO health worker told her about a safe home where her children could go and get an education.

“Without a second thought I signed up my children on the spot and later left my two daughters in their care when the little one was only six months old,” says Shilpy. “I just knew that they needed to be out of this place. I pay a portion of the tuition, and the NGO pays for the rest. I save $1 someday or $2 on good days and keep it for their education. The NGO lady assured me that my children would never have to return to the brothel. I want them to have a normal life and get married.”

With the closure, this future she planned for her children is no longer assured.

Shilpy is not alone; most of the sex workers face similar dilemmas.

Most sex workers in Bangladesh live hand-to-mouth existences, with only about one in nine having the ability to save up and feed themselves. On average, workers earn between $12 to $24 a day.

The truth is that many of these women may not return to sex work for some time after the pandemic has come under control.

Many stories describe men’s fears of getting COVID-19 when engaging sex workers. Fewer stories define how sex workers’ lives remain extraordinarily precarious and the risks they face of being infected with the novel coronavirus. The physical and psychological harm, abuse and exploitation, the perpetrators, sex buyers, and traffickers inflict on women and girls in prostitution remain with the sex workers forever.

Yet for Shilpy sex work was her means for survival.

“Now, as our place is closed, I have no way to earn, and I fear that my children will be ruined. I have no place to keep them. My family cut all family ties, and this is the only home I have.”

The post Alive Amidst the Mayhem of COVID-19 – A Sex Worker’s Story appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: United Nations

By Izumi Nakamitsu
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 9 2020 (IPS)

Humanity has faced no challenge greater than COVID-19 since the Second World War. As this rapidly developing global health emergency places unprecedented strain on our medical, economic and social systems, we must work hard to prevent new risks for instability, unrest and conflict.

The pandemic arrived as our frameworks to prevent catastrophic confrontation are crumbling. Countries are building faster and more accurate nuclear arms, developing new weapon technologies with unpredictable implications and pouring more resources into militaries than at any point in decades.

In the 75-year history of the United Nations, the folly of seeking security in vast destructive arsenals has never been clearer.Nor has the need to finally put the brakes on this deadly addiction.

Recognizing this, the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs (UNODA) remains fully active and committed to the important work of disarmament. We are adapting our working methods and substantive activities to continue operations during the COVID-19 crisis.

Our staff strives to be nimble and flexible, and we are carrying on work around the world to help people in all States apply every tool of disarmament to build a more peaceful and secure future.

I will explain how the pandemic is affecting each area of our Office’s work. I will also share some of the changes we are making to continue fulfilling our mandates and advancing the Secretary-General’s Agenda for Disarmament.

Working to eliminate all weapons of mass destruction

Our Office is working tirelessly with the States Parties of relevant treaties, instruments and bodies, as well as civil society and other actors, to continue pursuing a world free of all nuclear weapons and secure against threats from biological or chemical weapons.

The largest immediate impact of COVID-19 has been the postponement of the 2020 Review Conference of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which would have been an opportunity to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the Treaty’s entry into force and the twenty-fifth year since its indefinite extension.

It is important to remember, however, that the Review Conference will take place as soon as circumstances permit, fulfilling its tasks so critical to our collective security. We are working with the president-designate and bureau to make sure this happens.

Likewise, we are working with States and our colleagues across the Secretariat and the United Nations system to explore all options—from virtual meetings to online exercises—to help prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction to non-State actors; support instruments and processes from the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty to the Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction; enhance the preparedness of the existing Secretary-General’s Mechanism for the investigation of the use of chemical, biological and toxin weapons; and assist the Security Council in efforts to hold the perpetrators of chemical weapons use accountable.

Izumi Nakamitsu. Credit: United Nations

Tackling threats from conventional weapons

As Member States review plans to hold the Seventh Biennial Meeting of States on the Programme of Action on small arms and light weapons from 15 to 19 June, the Office for Disarmament Affairs is continuing to support the entire process for the meeting, including an elaboration of the Secretary-General’s report on small arms and light weapons.

With regard to the Group of Governmental Experts on “Problems arising from the accumulation of conventional ammunition stockpiles in surplus”, we are facilitating arrangements to hold discussions from 20 to 24 April, as scheduled, in a virtual, informal format. Our staff also continues to support the Chair in bilateral consultations with Experts during the intersessional period.

While the COVID-19 pandemic has delayed some of our practical support for conventional arms-focused projects in beneficiary countries, our Office continues to carry out essential preparatory work to guarantee their successful full implementation when the situation allows.

These temporary impacts extend to our European Union-funded project on Gender and Small Arms and Light Weapons, which we are continuing through the development of online training and desk research.

The global health emergency is similarly affecting our Office’s support for the African Union’s “Silencing the Guns” initiative through the Africa Amnesty Month Project, but we are carrying on consultations and coordination with national counterparts and key project partners, desk research, and preparation of workshop and sensitization material.

With our new funding mechanism, the Saving Lives Entity (SALIENT), the Office for Disarmament Affairs is collaborating with the United Nations Development Programme and the Peacebuilding Support Office to finalize administrative project documentation and compile terms of reference for field assessment missions in the beneficiary countries.

Our Office will also continue to service and update, as appropriate, the databases for our transparency mechanisms, the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms and the United Nations Report on Military Expenditures. Meanwhile, the United Nations SaferGuard Technical Review Board continues to actively engage through an online platform to review the International Ammunition Technical Guidelines. This review is expected to be finalized by the end of 2020, as scheduled.

Addressing emerging weapon technologies

Despite the postponement of the Disarmament Commission’s annual session, my Office continues to work closely with the Office for Outer Space Affairs and the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research to facilitate the next steps in multilateral deliberations to address the disarmament aspects of outer space.

These steps will include implementing and further developing transparency and confidence-building measures as well as elaborating effective measures for the prevention of an arms race in outer space. We will also continue to engage on these issues within the framework of the Conference on Disarmament and the General Assembly First Committee.

With regard to the Open-ended Working Group and the Group of Governmental Experts on information and telecommunications in the context of international security, I am committed to working with the Chair of each process to assess the need to change its meeting schedule.

To date, the Chair of the Open-ended Working Group has had to cancel a round of intersessional consultations scheduled for 30 and 31 March on the pre-draft of the Group’s report, requesting written contributions from delegations instead. Possible impacts on the other meetings of the two processes will be reviewed on an ongoing basis.

Ensuring continuity in Geneva-based disarmament processes

In Geneva, where the core business is to support meetings of disarmament conventions and bodies, COVID-19 is likely to impact meeting plans throughout the year.

So far, the Conference on Disarmament could not hold plenary meetings from 16 to 27 March as planned. With its session scheduled to resume on 25 May, our Office is supporting the current President in holding virtual consultations with the other Presidents of the 2020 session as well as regional coordinators.

The pandemic is also affecting planned consultations of other Geneva-based disarmament conventions. Our staff in Geneva is undertaking extensive consultations with office holders, States Parties and stakeholders to identify options ranging from cancellation to postponement to virtual alternatives.

We are also continuing our substantive support to these disarmament processes to the fullest extent possible.

Our Office is also pushing ahead in efforts to strengthen the financial sustainability of Geneva-based conventions. We are working closely with States to promote tools and platforms to address structural challenges across Conventions, while also increasing accountability, ownership and transparency.

Our projects in support of the Biological Weapons Convention and a prospective fissile material cut-off treaty are largely ongoing. We are also preparing strategic communications to mark the forty-fifth anniversary of the Biological Weapons Convention entering into force and the fortieth anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons.

Advancing disarmament education

In Vienna, the Office for Disarmament Affairs is continuing preparations to implement the online portion of the joint project on disarmament education it is undertaking with the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

Recently, this programme finished selecting 150 participants from a competitive field of more than 1,000 candidates. While the project’s eight-week online portion will commence on 6 April as planned, both organizations have agreed to postpone its in-person segment in Vienna.

We are also working with our partners to explore further development of our online disarmament education materials.

Promoting women’s empowerment & equal representation in disarmament

In a year that held much promise for celebrating and further accelerating progress and partnerships for gender equality and women’s empowerment, including in disarmament processes and forums, the COVID-19 crisis creates added uncertainty around the ability to advance this agenda amidst the competing priorities of Governments.

Our Office remains committed to promoting women’s leadership and full, equal and meaningful participation in all disarmament processes, including in meetings held in a virtual format, and to strengthening analysis and approaches that take into account the gendered impact of different weapons.

Promoting disarmament at the regional level

The three regional centres of the Office for Disarmament Affairs continue to operate and maintain regular contact with donors and beneficiary States. Although the pandemic has forced the postponement of in-person programmatic activities in Africa, in Latin America and the Caribbean, and in Asia and the Pacific, the centres continue to undertake related efforts that do not entail travel and operations on the ground.

In this regard, they are elaborating substantive notes, supporting the drafting of national action plans and carrying out other, similar functions.

Meanwhile, ongoing preparations for meetings and workshops by our Office will allow the centres to rapidly resume their full operations at the soonest opportunity. In addition, the regional centres continue to engage with donors on new projects.

Communicating with stakeholders

Our Office remains committed to providing Member States, the diplomatic community, non-governmental organizations and the public at large with unbiased, up-to-date and relevant information on multilateral disarmament, non-proliferation and arms control through our website and social media channels.

We are also continuing our work on upcoming publications, including the forty-fourth annual edition of the United Nations Disarmament Yearbook.

As States continue to finalize arrangements for upcoming meetings, we will keep interested stakeholders informed of their status regarding cancellations, postponements or virtual arrangements.

Our Office is also continuing its efforts to engage, educate and empower young people through online resources, including e-newsletters and the development of a dedicated youth website.

Looking ahead

The COVID-19 pandemic will test us all, and like World War II, it will transform our world in ways that are unforeseeable.

But let’s remember, unlike the trials of that horrific world war, we all face this crisis together.

This pandemic has the potential to unite societies, institutions and individuals, just as the hard lessons of the Second World War laid the foundation for deeper international cooperation and stronger institutions to support our common security.

The Office for Disarmament Affairs will remain a steady partner in our collective effort to prevent this global health emergency from breeding conflict.

And I sincerely hope that in our solidarity through this crisis, we will realize we can transcend our entrenched divisions to pursue our highest collective aspirations.

These include ensuring healthy lives, promoting the well-being of every citizen across the planet, and striving to build a peaceful and secure world for all.

Let us put humanity at the centre of our security.

The post Covid-19 & its Impact on the Work of Disarmament appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Izumi Nakamitsu is UN Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for Disarmament Affairs

The post Covid-19 & its Impact on the Work of Disarmament appeared first on Inter Press Service.

By Yasmine Sherif
Apr 9 2020 (IPS-Partners)

We are living in a crisis unprecedented since World War II: COVID-19. The pandemic brutally sweeps across the globe, where we already face a massive global learning crisis and multiple brutal humanitarian crises. How much more can those left furthest behind in forced displacement and armed conflicts take?

Across 26 countries of conflicts and forced displacement, host-governments are now struggling to find solutions for the 230 million estimated children and youth out of school, not the least the girls who are the most marginalized. UN agencies and civil society are trying their best to mitigate the impact of the Corona virus on their life and their learning. COVID-19 poses enormous risks for those left furthest behind, their learning and development, their safety, their food security, and their overall physical and mental health.

In response, Education Cannot Wait immediately conducted a rapid assessment in close conjunction with all our stakeholders and partners in-country ‘The Fierce Urgency of Now! Education In Emergency Response to COVID-19.’ The assessment paints an alarming picture of the huge impact that the COVID-19 crisis is having on already severely strained education systems in countries affected by conflicts and forced displacement. There is an acute shortage of distance learning tools and materials, which means that millions of students won’t be able to complete the current school year. Many do not have access to trusted and accurate information about the measures and behaviours that mitigate the threat of the virus.

In support of the COVID-19 Global Humanitarian Response Plan, ECW is doing what it can to deliver urgently needed assistance, both by making the necessary adjustments to existing programmes and by releasing funds to quickly move from face-to-face to distance learning. This entails stepping up investments in mental health and psychosocial support, water, sanitation and hygiene, as well as other cross-sectoral activities linked to student, teacher and parent well-being and protection against, and dealing with the impacts of, COVID-19.

Last week, ECW released it emergency reserve of US$23 million to 55 UN agencies and Non-governmental organizations to protect and support vulnerable girls and boys facing the COVID-19 pandemic in 26 crisis-affected countries. As the Chair of the Education Cannot Wait High-Level Steering Group and UN Special Envoy, Gordon Brown, stated: “Martin Luther King Jr spoke of the fierce urgency of now. The crisis is now and that is why ECW is making its entire emergency reserve available.”

When there is a crisis, one’s response cannot wait. To paraphrase Martin Luther King Jr “In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such thing as being too late.” At Education Cannot Wait, we encourage our strategic partners to help fill $50 million gaps now for the first three months from April to June and to stay with us throughout the entire emergency response and during the recovery in the aftermath of COVID-19.

The post The Fierce Urgency of Now appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Excerpt:

Yasmine Sherif, is Director of Education Cannot Wait

The post The Fierce Urgency of Now appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Credit: Martina Martelloni / INTERSOS

By Elena L. Pasquini
ROME, Apr 9 2020 (IPS-Partners)

Behind the Tiburtina Station, in the East of Rome, with just a small covered area protecting from the inclemency of the weather, sleeping close to each other is the only way to stay warm. A boy of Ivorian origin is alone, far from everyone, in the centre of the sidewalk, exposed to a freezing wind.

‘He told me he preferred to die of cold than to get infected, because he was very scared and he knew that it was not safe for him to be close to the others’, Dr. Antonella Torchiaro told Degrees of Latitude. She is a physician of the NGO Intersos, one of the few organisations carrying out prevention activity, medical examinations and screening of COVID-19 symptoms among those who do not have a secure roof over their head in the Italian capital.

An estimated eight thousand people are homeless in Rome; between fourteen and sixteen thousand, if the figure includes those who call ‘home’ an inadequate housing or who live in such extreme exclusion that their living conditions are comparable to those who are homeless.

About two hundred and fifty persons crowd the area of Tiburtina, where social distancing is hard, if not impossible, because the sheltered space is narrow. Among the most vulnerable population, there are also those who live in the squatted houses, mostly in the East of the city, and at the Termini station, in the centre.

They are migrants and Italians fearing not only the disease but the future, living without hand sanitiser, access to water, having lost their jobs, with few chances of getting what they need to survive.

Since April 1st, Intersos has deployed two social health teams in the field because the demands are so high: In just three weeks, the first mobile medical unit reached 610 people and performed 255 medical examinations. What is being protected, however, is not only the individual health but also the collective one: ‘It is as if this epidemic reveals [….] that the public health is made up of many rings and the people who live in a condition of fragility or social marginality are fundamental links in the chain. Excluding them means undermining everyone else’s health, the community. It is as if this moment reminded us how important it is to start from the most fragile ring to ensure the tightness of the entire system’, shared Torchiaro, who is also the medical coordinator of the clinic of Intersos24, a project which includes a primary care centre the Italian NGO has set up in Torre Spaccata, on the outskirts of Rome. It provides protection and support to unaccompanied minors, women who are victims of violence and exploitation, as well as young adults who are out of the national reception systems and are living in conditions of vulnerability.

Fear of the virus, fear of the future

Credit: Martina Martelloni / INTERSOS

Those met by Intersos’s physicians and cultural mediators behind Tiburtina Station are mostly migrants. They are waiting for the regularisation of their residence permit, sometimes they are passing through just to get their documents between one seasonal job and another in the agricultural areas of Foggia, Calabria or Northern Italy; or they are new adults expelled from the Italian reception system, employed under the table at car washes, restaurants or as unloaders. ‘It remains a place of transit for people who are temporarily homeless, for migrants in conditions of extreme social unease, exposed to labor exploitation’, Torchiaro said.

The work, even the illegal work, is no longer there, and those men and women, the unseen ghosts of the emergency, cannot imagine a future. Torchiaro observes, ‘At the moment everything is halted, so they are living suspended lives, lives that were already suspended as they waited for a residence permit or for an improvement to their conditions’.

The same is happening at Termini, where chronically homeless Italians and migrants, who get their living from handouts or from charities, find a shelter and where the inhabitants of the large buildings around Piazza Vittorio Emanuele gravitate. Those are the most fragile from the Chinese and Bengali communities, and being poorly integrated, they do not have easy access to the information necessary to protect themselves from the virus.

In the squatted houses, more information is being circulated among the better organised groups. Coming from the experience of the political struggle, these groups are more aware of what is happening and how to prevent the spread of the disease. ‘But they live with a double fear: [becoming ill] and losing their homes. Getting sick would mean leaving the house, jeopardising their squatting rights. It is the fear of losing the little they have’, Torchiaro stressed. As for the women assisted by Intersos: many are caregivers without a contract, some of which probably continue working without being able to protect themselves and without being entitled to paid leave should they contract the disease.

Credit: Martina Martelloni / INTERSOS

However, those who are on the streets experience the greatest despair, like the Afghan boy met by Torchiaro, homeless after finding and then losing a job. He carries the trauma of someone who comes from a wartorn country: ‘He suffers from panic attacks; he told me of the worsening of symptoms and insomnia. He told me he already had problems due to his past, his experience. And then the street, the difficulty of sleeping on the street. He told me: “Every evening, when I think I won’t be able to shelter myself from the cold, panic attacks come and now this fear of dying and not being able to do anything to protect myself is tormenting me”’.

People lacking the most important personal protective equipment — a home — feel more and more isolated: ‘In Termini, those who usually have oppositional behaviour are increasing. They are even more agitated and nervous; they feel their impotence quadrupled compared to normal conditions’. They often only manage to eat a single meal every day, most of the time just lunch, in the few soup kitchens left open or thanks to food distributions. ‘Moving around in Rome is now much more complex, especially for people who are afraid of being stopped by the police … This means the struggle to survive is increasing’, Torchiaro explained.

Fighting the virus among the most vulnerable

Prevention in the context of such fragility is particularly hard. In the stations, homeless people live in crowded spaces and have no way to bathe or wash hands: ‘We are distributing toilet kits, but they are not enough; alcoholic gel, wet wipes and surgical masks’. It is also difficult to make a differential diagnosis, that is to distinguish between COVID-19 and the normal flu because those who live on the streets not only run a greater risk of contracting the coronavirus and of not reaching the health services in time — ‘with risks for individual health and collective’ — but they are also much more exposed to other types of diseases. ‘That is one of the main expressions of inequalities in health. The possibility of protecting [the homeless] from common environmental factors would certainly simplify a possible early diagnosis’, Torchiaro added.

Credit: Martina Martelloni / INTERSOS

Many of them have previous diseases or chronic conditions, from hypertension to diabetes, from broncho pneumopathies to oncological pathologies. Often they know about the pandemic and the main prevention measures, but ‘we often find very fragile people — those with discomfort or mental difficulties, very old, who do not speak the language well, who are more isolated or do not have a community of reference — bewildered, frightened because they have the perception that we are certainly in an exceptional moment, but then, in the individual conversation, the lack of information comes out’.

Most of them want to be examined by Intersos’s doctors because they are scared. Only at the beginning of oIntersos’s activity, Torchiaro said, was there some distrust because after the Decree of 9 March imposing the lockdown, many nonprofit organisations have slowed down their activities in order to adapt to the new conditions and the areas of fragility in the city have been left to their own devices. Intersos itself had to change its way of working, closing the centre of Torre Spaccata and finding accommodation for its guests, asking for permits to operate and implementing new procedures ranging from individual protections to the daily sanitisation of uniforms and means of transport.

An extremely complex and time-consuming job, although the most demanding aspect, according to Torchiaro, is not so much the assistance to the people as the making sure that ‘the needs of those we meet’ get a concrete institutional response because the public institutions are currently struggling.

The opening of reception and active surveillance centres for the homeless is crucial: the Plan of the Municipality of Rome foresees the opening of 24H facilities for approximately 450 persons, but just 240 for the whole day. Pending this, Intersos is calling for the government to provide what is essential, water: ‘Awaiting the opening of the centres, which are the most urgent thing, strengthening or reopening the facilities dedicated to the personal hygiene of the homeless or [installing] chemical toilets [is fundamental]’.

Without adequate places to shelter those who do not have a home, prevention is impossible—it is impossible, without a home, to call health services, to enforce active surveillance and isolation, or to monitor symptoms. ‘At this moment, there are no places for active surveillance unless the person is positive for the swab, but the person [does] the swab only if he has done active surveillance’, Torchiaro explained.

‘The reality is that there is still no access to those centres, and in any case, they will not be enough.’

On March 19, however, Intersos signed an agreement with the Municipality of Rome to transfer people in particularly vulnerable conditions into a dedicated structure.

This story was originally published by Degrees of Latitude

The post Helping the homeless of Rome combat COVID-19 appeared first on Inter Press Service.

Women who have overcome depression are running therapy sessions to help others

Security forces in several states have allegedly abused their powers during the Covid-19 crisis.

Hundreds of thousands of people took part in protests across Slovakia in the weeks after journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kusnirova were killed, eventually forcing the resignation of the Prime Minister and Interior Minister. Credit: Ed Holt/IPS

By Ed Holt
BRATISLAVA, Apr 8 2020 (IPS)

Journalists and rights activists have welcomed the jailing of a man for the murders of Slovak investigative reporter Jan Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kusnirova, but say others involved in the killings must be convicted too if justice is to be fully served.

Self-confessed hired killer Miroslav Marcek, 37, was sentenced to 23 years in jail by a Slovak court this week.

At a hearing in January he had pleaded guilty to murdering the couple, both 27, in February 2018. He shot the pair at Kuciak’s home in Velka Maca, 40 miles east of the Slovak capital Bratislava.

But three other people – Tomas Szabo, Alena Zsuszova, and Marian Kocner – are also on trial over the murders and groups including the Slovak anti-corruption and rights movement Za slusne Slovensko (For a Decent Slovakia), which was formed in response to the killings, said it wanted to see everyone involved brought to justice.

“It is extremely important that the intermediaries and those who ordered the murder of Jan Kuciak are tried and punished….we await further convictions,” the group said in a Facebook post after Marcek’s sentencing.

The killings of Kuciak and Kusnirova shocked the nation and prompted the largest mass protests in the country since the fall of communism.

Prime Minister Robert Fico and Interior Minister Robert Kalinak were forced to resign, and the head of the police service later stepped down.

Police said that the murders were related to Kuciak’s work as an investigative journalist – Kuciak’s last story had exposed alleged links between Italian mafia and Fico’s Social Democracy party – and the subsequent investigation uncovered alleged links between politicians, prosecutors, judges, and police officers and the people allegedly involved in the killings.

At the centre of this was Kocner, a powerful local businessman with alleged links to organised crime, whom Kuciak had written about.

Charged with ordering Kuciak’s murder, for many he has become the central figure in the trial and a symbol of deep-rooted corruption at the highest levels of the state.

Following Marcek’s sentencing, attention has already turned to what sentence Kocner, if he is found guilty, will receive.

While some, including relatives of the murdered couple, said Marcek should have been jailed for even longer, others said that it was key that Kocner is seen to be given an even harsher sentence.

Pavol Szalai, head of European Union and Balkans Desk at press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF), told IPS: “I would not want to comment on whether Marcek’s sentence is long enough or not. What is important though is that if Kocner is found guilty he is given an exemplary sentence – a whole life sentence meaning he will stay in prison until the end of his natural life.

“For the mastermind of the murder, Marcek was dispensable, he was someone who was hired to kill. What is important is that if Kocner – who is allegedly the mastermind – had not ordered the killing, there would have been no murder of Jan Kuciak and Martina Kusnirova.”

Writing on the Slovak news website Aktuality.sk, where Kuciak was employed, comment writer Dag Danis, made a similar call.

He said after Marcek was sentenced: “The court should save the harshest punishment for Marian Kocner, who, according to prosecutors, ordered the ‘disappearance’ of Jan Kuciak in the naïve belief that it would silence other journalists.”

Kocner has denied the charges against him, as have Zsuzsova, who is accused of arranging Kuciak’s killing, and Szabo, who is charged with helping Marcek carry out the murder.

The court hearings are in their early stages and those following them are so far reluctant to speculate on the outcome.

In an editorial just before the start of the trial the Sme daily suggested that Kocner would probably not be found guilty. But some journalists who spoke to IPS said that the proceedings over the initial few days of hearings had led them to believe he may actually be convicted.

Whatever happens, local journalists have said the outcome of the trial will be a watershed in Slovak history, in terms of both restoring public trust in a judiciary which the Kuciak murder investigation has shown to apparently be riddled with corruption, and in showing that same judiciary can clearly punish crimes designed to silence journalists.

For some, Marcek’s conviction has gone some way to doing that.

Drew Sullivan, editor at the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, told IPS: “Impunity is the norm with the killing of journalists. Usually, less than 10 percent of these cases are solved and many of those don’t ultimately get to the person who ordered it. So far this case looks like a pleasant outlier.”

However, others point out that Marcek’s conviction alone is not enough.

Gulnoza Said, Europe and Central Asia programme co-ordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), told IPS: “The sentencing of confessed hitman Miroslav Marcek is an important step towards justice. We hope to see full justice through fair trial and punishment of all those involved in the assassination, including the masterminds.

“Unfortunately, we see way too often how killers get away with the murder of journalists. Ending impunity is crucial for the safety of all journalists.”

Related Articles

• Slovak Journalist’s Trial a Fundamental Moment to Prove if Country can Punish Crimes Designed to Silence Journalists
• Never Been a Worse Time to be a Journalist

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A new documentary about Liverpool's Senegal winger reveals he had to run away to play football, Klopp didn't like him at first and Senegalese fans are pretty harsh.

The pair discovered the faulty machines at a hospital in Nigeria and taught themselves to fix them.