Opinion: The Private Sector Drives Response to Europe’s Refugee Crisis

MR JOHN DENTON AO, CHAIRMAN OF AUSTRALIA FOR UNHCR

Last year, as Europe faced a growing number of boat arrivals, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees warned the European Union that the time for talk was over. 

“We are facing a moment of truth,” he said. “Richer nations must acknowledge refugees for the victims they are, fleeing from wars they are unable to prevent or stop. Wealthier countries must decide to shoulder their fair share at home and abroad, or hide behind walls as the chaos spreads across the world.”

Prophetic words indeed, but it took the image of a drowned child to finally galvanise some action.

While the EU continued to argue about what a combined response to the crisis might entail, the heart wrenching photograph of three-year- old Aylan Kurdi lying on a Turkish beach prompted a global outpouring of community compassion and generosity and put the onus on governments and big business to follow suit.

In Germany and Austria, local people greeted refugee families with gifts of food, blankets and children’s toys. In Australia too, the initial response came primarily from the private sector – from individuals like James Wright, a Melbourne father of two, who used social media to encourage his fellow Melbournians to donate their unused fares during the city’s train strike and raised over $41,000 for UNHCR’s relief operations for Syrian refugees. Within days, the Australian government had announced a $20 million contribution towards UNHCR operations for Syria and an increased intake of 12,000 Syrian refugees.

These are the reasons we established Australia for UNHCR fifteen years ago.

UNHCR is the world’s leading agency for refugees. Founded by the United Nations in the wake of World War II, it has a global mandate to assist and protect people fleeing from conflict and work with governments to find durable solutions for them. 

Through Australia for UNHCR, Australians are able to support the agency’s emergency and humanitarian programs. Funds raised help refugees in situations of crisis, assisting the work of UNHCR’s teams on the ground and providing emergency relief and shelter items.

In recent weeks, as those desperate scenes from Europe have been beamed around the world, dozens of individual Australians have approached me to ask how they could help. From my experience with our many thousands of donors, Australians do care about refugees and feel a moral responsibility, as citizens of the world, to provide a lifeline for these frightened people fleeing the ravages of war.

The global refugee crisis has become the biggest humanitarian issue of our times and demands a concerted response from us all.

Leading the way in Australia as high profile supporters of UNHCR are firms like Corrs Chambers Westgarth, Australia Post, Colonial First State Global Asset Management, PwC and Perpetual. Other Australian corporates looking for ways to act and support the calls of their employees should find a way to help UNHCR do its essential life-saving work, and help the women and children cast adrift from war-torn nations like Syria.

John W.H. Denton AO is Chief Executive Officer of Corrs Chambers Westgarth Lawyers and the founding Chair of Australia for UNHCR.   

'Invisible' Emergency in Ethiopia

Naomi Steer Ethiopian Mission - April 2015

A few weeks ago I visited the Gambella region of Ethiopia which over the last year has seen more than 195,000 refugees from South Sudan flee across the border.

This is one of the many ‘invisible’ emergencies UNHCR is dealing with at any one time. It is surprising that that there is little or no media coverage of what is one of the largest refugee crises in Africa today. In fact, Ethiopia is now hosting the largest refugee population in Africa with 700,000 refugees. And with only 10% of its operations funded, UNHCR needs much more support.

I had heard about the dire situation for refugees in the camps in Gambella when the emergency first began back in 2013. This was compounded by a very harsh environment (the week my visit temperatures were averaging 45 degrees). There is lack of amenities and many of the newly arriving refugees are malnourished and in generally poor condition. 

While the situation remains difficult, I was amazed at what my UNHCR colleagues and partners had managed to achieve despite the undeniable challenges.

On the day I flew in from Addis Ababa, there was an unseasonal break in the high temperatures. Rain clouds hovered but a torrential downpour only came on the last night making travel the next day tricky.

When the rain comes, large parts of the Gambella region, which extends across a swampy flood plain, become submerged. Last year two large refugee camps - Leitchuor and Nip Nip - were overwhelmed by flooding. This year, to avoid a repeat of the disaster, UNHCR is embarking on an ambitious plan to transport 50,000 refugees settled in the most vulnerable areas to higher grounds. It’s a race against time and UNHCR with its Ethiopian government partner ARRA are mobilising every conceivable form of transport including boats, helicopters and trucks, to relocate refugees to a new refugee camp JEWI ( pronounced Jowie) which has been carved out of the bush 12 kilometres from Gambella town.

Pagak Border Transit Centre

On arrival I go straight to the South Sudan/Ethiopian border crossing at Pagak. It is here that thousands of refugees crossed over when tensions between the South Sudanese President and his Deputy sent the country into civil war at the end of December 2013.

At the Pagak Border Transit Centre I sit down to talk with new arrivals who are about to be registered by UNHCR. Nyatiang Emok Dey tells me she had walked for seven days from her village in Upper Nile State with her three young children. She describes the trip to me as ‘very terrible’ and you can see the exhaustion in the bodies and faces of the young family. She is one of the thousands of mothers who have fled South Sudan. In fact 90% of the camps I visit over the next few days are made up of women and children.

Sitting quietly beside Nyatiang is an old woman who could be anything from 50 to 80 years old. It is hard to tell but her rheumy eyes have clearly seen years of hardship. Nyayul Chol doesn’t know her age. She tells me she arrived with her grandson after travelling by truck and then walking the rest of the way. She looks so frail I wonder how she managed. Once in the camp she will be issued with a package for the elderly – a special ration of maize, a commode, extra cooking utensils, mattress, extra blankets and crutches (if necessary) and eye glasses. 

Nyayul is one of the many elderly people I meet in the camp. This strikes me as unusual as often older people will stay back in the village despite the dangers. But it appears that everyone is upping stumps from the hardest hit South Sudanese states of Unity, Upper Nile and Jonglei. These new arrivals will be taken to either Kule or Tierkidi camps not far along the road.

Kule Camp

We travel that road to Kule camp ourselves with a steady stream of locals herding their cattle or selling local produce. Kule is home to about 47,000 refugees, most of whom arrived after a second wave of violence hit South Sudan in May 2014. My first meeting is with community leaders elected by their fellow refugees to voice their concerns and needs. They list food as their number one priority followed by shelter, education, livelihoods and SGBV prevention.

The women leaders give firsthand accounts of being attacked collecting firewood outside the camp or taking their maize and wheat grain to the nearby ‘shanty’ town to be milled. There is a primary school but no secondary school. Umjimma Abdahado, a 43-year-old mother of seven, suggests the need for a ‘women’s friendly school’ so women can also learn to read and write - a sign of the social changes resulting from displacement. Back home in South Sudan, men would be more literate and would handle ‘outside business’. Here, with so many husbands or fathers absent, women are having to take on new roles and need to be literate to do so.

Nyakhor: the very name symbolises the ongoing cycle of violence South Sudan has experienced. Nyakhor means ‘child of war’. Thirty-five years after being born in conflict she now sadly sees her own children becoming ‘children of war’. Nyakhor however is determined that the time in refugee camps won’t be a wasted opportunity for her family. ”We will not sit simply like blind men or women but we will do something,” she tells me.

There is certainly no ‘sitting still’ in the child friendly space funded by UNHCR and run by partner Plan Ethiopia. The under 5 ‘safe place to play’ is a hive of activity with kids turning out amazing Lego constructions: bridges, supply trucks and wheels. Most of the staff  are also refugees and they are glad of the small income this work provides. 

There are so many unaccompanied children here who have become separated from their parents during the fighting. They are fostered out to relatives or other families and receive a special package of Non Food Items including clothes, blankets, books and school supplies. I hand over some basketballs and soccer balls which are quickly swept up by the kids in a fast and furious game on the rocky ground.

Nutrition Centre

Next stop is the Nutrition Centre run by NGO partner GOAL Program. Myamal Galwak sits quietly in the Outpatient Therapeutic Clinic nursing her nine month old baby who is contentedly sucking on a sachet of peanut based high protein Ready-To-Use-Food called Plumpy’nut – all the while giving loving smiles to mum and coy ones to me. 

The staff say this tiny but healthy girl was at death’s door two months ago when she arrived in the camp severely malnourished and sick with watery diarrhoea. After being put on an intensive feeding program she has gained weight and is on the road to recovery.

Adequate nutrition is a big issue here and high levels of malnutrition persist. Last year UNHCR and WFP mounted an extraordinary appeal calling for help to fund feeding needs for displaced people inside South Sudan and for refugees like the people I am meeting now. Australian donors through Australia for UNHCR responded by donating over $600,000 in support. Across Gambella the very high rate of Crude and Under 5 Mortality rates have been reduced to acceptable levels largely due to the efforts of UNHCR and its partners managing diseases such as malaria, dehydration secondary to diarrhoea and complications of severe malnutrition.

Tierkidi Refugee Camp

Shelter is another big need. Standing on the hill looking out over Tierkidi refugee camp I see the neatly ordered rows of tents stretch out below me. Despite being here for more than nine months, 85% of the camp still ‘lives under canvas’. With the average tent life only six months, upgrading accommodation is really urgent and I am hoping Australia for UNHCR can provide support in this area. 

I visit a family in one of the transitional shelters with bamboo walls, mud daubing and a thatched roof based on the traditional village home called the 'tukel’. It is surprisingly cool inside and Nyakong Loung Louy has somehow managed to create a welcoming home for her family. A table holds neatly stacked cooking pots and dainty tea glasses. Sleeping mats hung over a roof beam. Nyakong tells me she comes from Bor, ‘a proper town’ where her husband had a good job working with NGOs. Her 16-year-old daughter, Nyaku, arrived here at the camp before her. Believing she would never see her family again, she tells me, she was overwhelmed when she was reunited with her mother. 'I couldn’t believe I would see her again. I thought she might have died. But when I saw her standing there I was overwhelmed and thanked God. You think you will be separated but then you come together again,' she still says with disbelief and amazement in her voice. 

RADA Rehabilitation Centre

If I need any further evidence of the resilience of refugees here and the commitment of UNHCR and its partners to do their best, my last stop confirms it. We arrive at the RADA Rehabilitation Centre. Inside, a number of disabled men are exercising with great purpose on stationary bikes, treadmills and a bench press.

Enoch Dak is the Chair of the Committee for Disability. The 21-year-old comes from the Upper Nile. Disabled from the age of two by polio, Enoch appears very small in his wheelchair. However, after I strike up a conversation with him, he is very engaged and emanates a huge determination and spirit. He tells me after his village was attacked, he fled with his aunt and her 7 children. At first he wheeled himself in his tricycle wheelchair along the dirt road. He then got a punctured tyre and the family was unable to push him in the mud. His aunt and cousins then carried him for five days. He says they saw no other transport in all that time.

Arriving at Pagak with thousands of other refugees at the height of the emergency, Enoch spent 21 days living without any support facilities. As newly elected Chair of the Disability Committee he is working with UNHCR and other partners to improve conditions for the many disabled in the camp, including latrines with room enough for commodes, more wheelchairs and crutches. 

For Bol Gatkuoth, this is the second time he has become a refugee. He spent his youth in a refugee camp where he says he got his education at both primary and secondary school. Returning  to South Sudan in 2009, he started working with the rehabilitation of child solders but then war broke out again and he fled with his young family, first to the UN Compound in Malakal, South Sudan and then on foot across the border. On the way his young child died from dysentery.

It is almost unimaginable to me how this smart young man still has any optimism after what he has endured but Bol tells me 'you have to look to the future'. Facing perhaps many more years in exile, he hopes to get a scholarship to enable him to undertake a Masters in Social Work so he can help people.

A number of the disabled men I met were victims of disease but there were others like 19-year-old Gatiwal who lost his right leg after being shot in the conflict back in South Sudan. UNHCR and RADA helped him get a prosthetic leg fitted in Addis Ababa. Gatiwal tells me the fitting rubs against the smashed bone in his upper thigh but he says stoically that ‘I am proud now to be standing on two legs again’.

I feel quite humbled by the strength of those I have met - both refugees and aid workers. When I apologise for only being able to bring a few footballs, one of the staff kindly admonishes me. ‘What you (Australia for UNHCR) have given is not a little thing, it’s a great contribution. And it’s more than funds or balls. You coming here make us feel that someone is looking after us. It’s not a minor thing.’ 

Take action on World Humanitarian Day

Today is World Humanitarian Day, which is our opportunity to celebrate the spirit that inspires humanitarian work around the globe. When we asked our staff what being a humanitarian meant we got a mix of answers. “Someone that puts others before them.” “Being kind to other people and respecting their rights.” “Seeing beyond race or religion.” Or as someone said to me, “it means the love of humanity.”

As the head of Australia for UNHCR, it’s my job is to ask Australians to support someone who has no one else to rely on, in another country thousands of kilometres away who they are unlikely to ever meet. The fact that we currently have 70,000 Australians who are doing just that is something very personally inspiring, and it’s also a strong message that Australians do care about refugees.

UNHCR is a unique organisation to work for with 80 per cent of my colleagues working on the frontline, often in remote places and conflict zones. Today we are raising funds for UNHCR’s emergency operations in some of those places through our Action Hour campaign, which we just launched in Melbourne.

On the frontline of the South Sudan crisis

Right now, conflict-torn South Sudan is facing one of its biggest crises with thousands of refugees fleeing to neighbouring countries and many more displaced within the country itself. As in so many conflicts, it is civilians – ordinary men, women and children – who suffer most.

I went to see for myself what the situation was like on the South Sudan border during a recent three-day visit with UNHCR colleagues to Kakuma refugee camp where Australia for UNHCR has funded projects for a number of years.

Crossing the border

I went first to Nadapal Border Transit centre where I spoke with newly arriving refugees who had travelled there by truck, bus and the last kilometre by Kenyan taxis (a rather incongruous sight in the bush). Many had been stranded on the other side of the flooded river and had spent a nerve wracking time fearing they might be forced back into South Sudan.

International Women’s Day – Meet the inspiring Ana Calvo

8 March is International Women’s Day, and this year, to celebrate women and their achievements across the world, we want to introduce to you just one of the many inspiring women that work for UNHCR.

Dr Ana Calvo currently lives in Jordan and works as the Public Health Officer at Zaatari Refugee Camp in Jordan – the second largest refugee camp in the world. We spoke to her about her hard work to help Syrian refugees.

Dr Ana Calvo

What is your background?

I’m Spanish and a medical doctor by training. I have worked in the aftermath of many emergencies, both after natural disasters and when populations have been forced to flee due to conflict. I’ve spent time in many countries such as Mozambique, Colombia, Afghanistan, Myanmar and Kosovo. Basically, any situation where people suddenly have to flee their homes I have been there.

Women On Top

By Naomi Steer, National Director, Australia for UNHCR 

It can be lonely at the top – and no more so than for women in public life who, despite the rewards, also face daily scrutiny, sometimes personal vilification and in some cases even violence.

 If the recently published  IPU Women in National Parliaments ranking is anything to go by, it looks like it will be even lonelier with Australia’s  ranking of 43, well behind our sisters in New Zealand (25), Denmark (13) and perhaps surprisingly, number one-ranked Rwanda.

However, in this at least we are not alone. The report Sex and Power 2013: Who Runs Britain? by the Centre for Women and Democracy, bemoans the falling numbers of women in the UK in senior levels of the judiciary, education, the arts, finance, the civil service and government.

Refugee fathers hope for the future amidst war in Syria

By Naomi Steer, National Director, Australia for UNHCR

The suspected use of chemical weapons in Syria last week has taken the ongoing crisis to a new level. The conflict has already seen one million Syrian children become refugees, with the total number of refugees now close to two million. Such figures are overwhelming, and I believe it is important to remember that these millions of refugees are real people, each with their own story to share.

When I write about refugees it is often to highlight the challenges that refugee women and children face. This in part reflects the fact they make up 80 percent of the refugee population, and are often the most vulnerable in conflict situations.

But in saying this, there is no less concern for the millions of men who alone or together with their families are also forced from their homes, often into dangerous and uncertain futures.

On my recent mission to Jordan I met and interviewed Syrian refugees, including a number of men – fathers, husbands and sons – about their experiences as refugees.   

I found young dad, Mohamad, surrounded by young kids playing soccer on a rocky field. He and his wife, Suzanne, and young family had arrived in Zaatari Refugee Camp in Jordan almost 12 months before fleeing the besieged city of Dara in southern Syria.

At home in his village while his wife taught at the local school he ran the local soccer competition. His team Al Majed had won several premierships, and although he joked his glory days as a forward were behind him he said he now really enjoyed coaching.

Playing soccer is an important social outlet for refugee children at Zaatari Refugee Camp in Jordan.

International Women’s Day insights on refugee women

UNHCR currently is responsible for more than 33.9 million people worldwide (one and half times larger than Australia’s population). Eighty per cent of refugees are women and children.

We know the day-to-day struggle for many women around the world is extremely tough but the situation for refugee women is even more precarious. Displacement compounds the many issues women already face such as sexual and gender based violence, poor reproductive health, and limited access to education and income generation.

To mark International Women’s Day I wanted to share a few of my insights after working 13 years to support UNHCR and refugee women in particular.

Lesson 1: Refugee camps can provide opportunity

Refugee camps are large, often chaotic and unpleasant places to be. But with the right resources they can provide opportunities for positive change for women. From having access to education or skills training not available in a home country torn apart from war through to being able to access health and nutrition programs, these are key foundations to improving women’s wellbeing, and the wellbeing of their families.

One of my great memories is attending a women’s support group in Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya near the Sudanese border which featured in series one of SBS’ Go Back to Where you Came From.

In a cool shelter, a happy and very talkative collection of mothers were sharing health tips for their children and families under the guiding hand of a nutritionist.

Mothers and babies at 'Breast is Best' in Kakuma refugee settlement, Kenya. Photo Australia for UNHCR/ T Mukoya

Under a program called ‘Breast is Best’, women learnt the value of prolonging breast feeding both to improved nutrition for babies but also as a natural form of  family planning enabling better spacing of children. Beaming mums held their bouncing babies aloft as the very real proof of ‘Breast is Best’ practice.

One woman with a huge smile showed off her two children - her 18 month old daughter healthy but slightly smaller than her very roly-poly younger brother who had been nurtured with longer breast feeding. We all laughed at this very human ‘before and after’ demonstration.

Lesson 2: Education is the key to the advancement of women

Education is a key way to improve women’s health outcomes and overall wellbeing. However refugee girls have limited access to schooling. In refugee camps in East Africa for example one in five refugee girls aged 12 to 17 attend schools and only one in three advances to secondary school.

Repeated studies show that the higher the rates of participation of girls in both formal and informal education the better the health outcomes for the whole community, including lower birth rates and reducing practices like female genital mutilation (FGM). 

Girls in school are more likely to avoid early marriage. Education can help secure a better job and provide benefits to the whole family. It leads to higher incomes, lower birth rates, reduced infant mortality and increased public health.Twelve year old Vivita fled Congos’ war with her family and now lives in Nairoi. UNHCR helped her join school by paying for her uniform and her giving her hope for the future. “I believe  if I work hard I will succeed in my studies. I also believe I will be able to achieve all of my dreams,” she said.

Lesson 3: Men are part of the solution

There has been a significant shift in the way community education is undertaken around ‘women’s issues’.

Realising that to effect change you need the whole community on board, UNHCR now targets religious and community leaders, fathers and  brothers to become ‘champions for change’ around violence against women, child marriage, eliminating FGM practice, family planning and education of girls.

Late last year I was in Dollo Ado refugee camp on the Ethiopian/Somali border reviewing our projects we had funded for emergency and longer term support to famine victims fleeing Somalia in 2011.

One year before aid agencies were overwhelmed by the dying. One year later the refugee community was getting back on its feet, able for the first time in many months to start thinking beyond basic survival.

Refugees wanted better infrastructure in the camp, better housing, better water supply, more training and work opportunities. They wanted to live with dignity and security. For women this meant being free from the threat of violence.

Men are powerful advocates for women in Dollo Ado refugee camps in Ethiopia. Photo UNHCR/ D.Corcoran

I met with a group of community activists of all ages, men and women. They were employed to visit refugee families in their camp, providing counseling around domestic violence and practical support such as police intervention where necessary, encouraging girls to go to school and advocating against FGM as a practice.

I was bowled over by their total commitment and passion - and also the results they were getting. According to their estimates, FGM practice in this one camp had been reduced by 40 per cent since their intervention.

I wondered out loud why the men present were so proactive around this initiative. Looking at me as though I was a bit dim, one young man responded that of course men should be involved. It was a question of women’s human rights, he said. Their right not to be mutilated, their right to enjoy good health. He said many of the fathers and husbands he spoke to had no idea about the connection between FGM and the birth complications so many women suffered as a result. Once this was pointed out to them they changed their minds as they loved their daughters and wives.

Everybody in the group nodded in agreement with one elderly gent sporting a spectacular hennaed red beard patting him on the back.

Wow. With men and women like this we change the world!

Lesson 4: simple solutions work

Every year some 536,000 women die in childbirth. Refugee women are particularly vulnerable, often giving birth in remote, overcrowded camps without access to medical care. Improving maternal health is one of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDG) adopted by the international community in 2000. There is still a significant gap between the current reduction by 47 per cent and the MDG goal of reducing maternal mortality by 75 per cent.

To respond to these needs Australia for UNHCR has funded a number of Safe Mother and Baby programs in Myanmar, Chad and Somalia. At the heart of these programs is the distribution of the Clean Delivery Kits.

The kit is made up of made up of a plastic sheet for the mother to give birth on instead of the dirt floor, soap for the mother and midwife to wash their hands and the baby after delivery, a razor blade to cut the umbilical cord, a piece of string to tie the cord off and a piece of clean cloth to wrap the baby in. The kit also includes an information sheet which shows in a series of diagrams the danger signs to watch for when to go to help and some very simple baby resuscitation techniques.

The key benefit of the kit is to help women give birth in a sterile environment and to cut down life threatening infection.

Where the kits have been introduced in emergency settings maternal and neo natal morbidity has been dramatically reduced.

For a cost of around $2.70 each, the kits prove that often the solution can be as simple as piece of soap!

Lesson 5: we are all connected – the power of technology

When I return home from visiting camps I often receive follow up texts from refugees I have met. “Naomi you promised this...” “Naomi don’t forget...” ”Naomi how is the fundraising going?”  Technology has made the world much smaller and in the case of refugees much more accessible.

In Nakivale refugee camp in Uganda, we funded our first ever computer training centre with internet access and established an internet café. Last year the first batch of graduates received their certificate in basic computer skills, a proud moment for the students and their trainers also refugees.

Refugees in the Nakivale Computer Access Centre connecting with the outside world. Photo Australia for UNHCR / September 2011

With internet access, refugees can now sign up to a site called Refugees United, a sort of refugee Facebook where you can post your refugee profile and trace or be traced by lost family or friends. In Nakivale, many families have been reunited with families in other camps and in countries across the world. It shows the power of technology to cross divides, regardless of your circumstances and no matter where you live.

When I asked one of the trainers, a young Somali woman, what it meant to have computer and internet access she replied “It makes me feel more than a refugee”.

For me, that one statement alone made the project worthwhile!

Conclusion

When I have visited camps and spoken to women I know there are many common connections with women globally – as mothers our roles are the same, as income earners, as caregivers. The circumstances we live in may change, but as women we have much in common.

I have also learnt that women are incredibly resilient. It would be easy to typecast refugee women and victims, living in poverty, torn apart by conflict, subjected to unimaginable conditions and facing constant struggles in their life.

But they also overcome incredible adversity, they still nurture their families and they still seek opportunities for advancement. We share common issues about serious issues such as participation in decision making, violence against women and women’s health. And I am proud to say that women are, by and large, always ready to help and support other women.

This International Women’s Day let’s celebrate the many amazing refugee women who with courage, resourcefulness and good humour, overcome the many challenges that displacement from home and country brings.

For more stories of inspiration, please visit our photo gallery celebrating refugee women.

Celebrating the little things: One Direction and refugees have more in common than you may think

What does Niall Horan, the Irish lead singer in boy band sensation One Direction, want for Christmas? The action packed FIFA 13, a racetrack ready Audi R8, a new guitar? Maybe. But like most of us at this time of year, what Niall really wants most of all is to “go home” to spend a quiet and peaceful Christmas with his family relaxing in his native Ireland. Or in his words – care of the Irish Times – “We have little traditions like going to the pub on Christmas Eve and watching telly all day. It will be the same as always and that’s what I love about it.”

How do I know this you may ask, being outside the usual boy band demographic? Because my 16 year old One Direction obsessed daughter Elysia, also currently thousands of miles away from home, sends me frequent, loving and slightly manic updates via Skype and email about her current adventures as part of a school exchange in Japan. And from what I can gather, her new friends apparently are equally crazy about young Niall as their visiting Australian guest.

I can’t wait for Elysia to arrive home – on Christmas Eve – happily just in time for the annual family gathering. And like Niall, we will be enjoying a traditional get together with family and friends.

International Women's Day 2012 - Part ONE

A few weeks ago, I attended the wedding of my good friends Aminata and Antoine. Theirs was a very Sydney love story. Boy meets girl at Opera Bar. Boy goes home to France. Love blossoms. Emails and texts fly back and forth across. Boy returns to Australia et voila! There we were overlooking the sunset harbor, toasting the health and happiness of our two dear friends. What made this occasion even more special than most was the joy everyone felt knowing the long and dangerous journey Aminata had travelled to get there.

Aminata was only 19 years old when rebels attacked her village in Sierra Leone and took her hostage. As she recounted, "I can still see their faces as if it were yesterday. I was standing frozen with my family when one of the rebels took my hand and ordered me to follow.

Visiting Nakivale

Monday 24 October marked United Nations Day a global occasion to highlight, celebrate and reflect on the work of the United Nations and its family of specialised agencies. It was also an opportunity to recognise the support and contribution of civil society to the UN through organisations such Australia for UNHCR. UNHCR is increasingly relying on support from individuals around the world, and Australians are making a very big contribution to its work in many ways.

A few weeks ago five donors and I completed our “Nakivale Trek for Refugees”, which involved an incredibly hard five-day slog through the Ruwenzori mountain range in western Uganda.

To say it was challenging is an understatement. The Ruwenzoris are remote, rugged, and very very wet. Although we had been warned about the muddy conditions, we were totally unprepared when we had to abandon our walking shoes and spend five days in gumboots, slipping and squelching our way through the endless bogs and marshes that made us feel as though we had stumbled onto the set of Lord of the Rings.

What kept us all going was the terrific camaraderie that quickly developed amongst us (inevitable perhaps when you are all sharing the same tent), as well as the knowledge that we were doing this for a worthwhile cause.

Perhaps it was not surprising then that all the trekkers felt the highlight of this journey was not surmounting the peaks of the Ruwenzoris, beautiful as they were, but the day we spent in the Nakivale refugee settlement at the end of the trek.

Although one day was not nearly long enough to see and experience the many facets of this settlement, we were able to visit a number of projects supported by Australia for UNHCR donors.

Some of our experiences were confronting, which is a reality in refugee situations. As one of our party described his visit to the health centre, “For me the visit to the health centre was very confronting. The day we visited there were approximately 500 people at the health centre awaiting medical treatment. This was a relatively quiet day despite most rooms being filled to capacity. It is tough to imagine what a busy day is like. To our shock we were told that the whole refugee settlement had only two doctors due to the skills shortage, which is crazy to think considering the population is almost 60,000.

A young boy receives treatment in the health centre

To end our health centre tour we visited the children’s ward - a space the size of a small classroom - where we met a three year old boy who had lost sight in one eye and had third degree burns to more than 50% of his body due to him pulling down a pot of boiling water on himself in the family’s makeshift kitchen.”

In a totally different experience in the afternoon we attended the opening of the computer training centre, which is also funded by Australian donors. On its first day of operations more than 900 young people signed up for computer training skills. The centre also had internet access, which has opened up a whole world of new possibilities to refugees, such as distance education.

Australian donors should be proud that they have helped achieve so much in Nakivale and that through our support to UNHCR we are part of a much bigger global humanitarian family.

To find out more about Australia for UNHCR's work in Nakivale, please visit our website.

"Uwe Na Safari Njema"

Source: Google Maps

Well I am now counting down the hours till lift off and I will soon arrive in Uganda for the Nakivale Refugee Trek 2011. Am I ready? Not really. I haven’t done half the training I had hoped for but I am setting off with 5 fellow Australia for UNHCR donors on our Fundraising Challenge which involves trekking over 30km up the Rwenzori Mountain range in south-west Uganda. This is a very remote part of Uganda. On one side of the mountain range is Congo and on the other Rwanda, and about two hours away is Nakivale Refugee Settlement which is our final destination on this trek.

Last night our guides emailed to say the rainy season has come early so we need to bring plenty of wet gear. So, although I have packed my poncho, boots, and plenty of spare socks, I will be praying for sunshine by the time we arrive at the mountain.

Our donor trek team has done an amazing job and raised about $40,000 with more to come. The funds raised will go towards our projects in Nakivale to support clean drinking water projects, improved health services and more educational support for the many thousands of young people who live in the settlement.

In Nakivale, our Australia for UNHCR project manager Kayte Webb is planning a great welcome. Australian donors have helped fund the first ever Computer Technology Access Centre (CTA) and this will officially open on Tuesday 20^th September with lots of entertainment provided by refugee musicians and performers. Lameck, a refugee from Congo, is a fantastic rap artist and the Burundian drummers are sensational. I know that there are already refugees lining up, eager to use the computer facilities, learn new skills and have access via technology to a wider world.

A group of students at school in
Nakivale Refugee Settlement

I am also helping Kayte to launch our Skype project through which we will link up a school in Australia and school children in Nakivale via a real-time video connection. This hasn’t been done anywhere else in the world so another first for Australia for UNHCR and our donors!

I look forward to telling you about how the trip goes as well as our projects in Nakivale. We are hoping to do another trip next year up Mt Kilimanjaro so please contact Sue Cowden at Australia for UNHCR if you are interested. In the meantime I hope you travel well - or as my Kenyan friends say Uwe na safari njema.

Naomi Steer

A Sliver Of Hope Amid The Gloom

Australia for UNHCR National Director Naomi Steer has just left famine-stricken Somalia – a situation described as “the worst humanitarian disaster in the world”.

I was in Somalia last week when the United Nations declared parts of the country to be in famine. With some estimates putting acute malnutrition rates as high as 50% in southern parts of the country, the scenario is very grim. Refugee camps in Kenya and Ethiopia are overflowing with new arrivals desperately seeking relief assistance. With an estimated 3.7 million people affected by the drought – that’s one in every two Somalis – the situation is very bad.

I was in Galkayo district as part of a UNHCR mission looking at the situation of displaced people within Somalia and how Australians might provide support. Flying into Galkayo, the landscape below was tough, red, rocky earth.

Galkayo is in the middle of Somalia, midway between the capital Mogadishu and the coastal town of Bossaso, a jumping-off point for refugees trying to make it across the Gulf of Aden into Yemen. In my pre-mission security briefing I had been advised to keep a low profile, be appropriately covered at all times and to avoid conflict. I was given a card with advice about what to do if taken hostage. It was all pretty confronting stuff but necessary given Galkayo is rated as a Level 5 Security Phase, one short of the most extreme rating of 6. All movement round Galkayo is with an armed security escort. A strict curfew is enforced between 8am and 5pm.

During my stay, I visited several camps for internally displaced people (IDPs). The path to one settlement was strewn with discarded blue plastic bags – the “Galkayo flower” as someone cynically described it to me. People were squatting in the dirt making shelters out of twigs and rags and cardboard. They were barely able to keep out the never-ending wind and sandy grit that clung to everything. In one camp, a newly arrived family worked against the clock to get their shelter up before night. Their meagre belongings, carted many hundreds of miles from their village in the south, lay strewn on the ground around their camp site. They had gathered together a collection of used vegetable oil tins which they were going to use as a bed base. Next door a woman had gathered rocks together as her base and she cried as she told me she had never thought her life would lead to this situation.

Outside, a chirpy little boy showed me his torn-off thumbnail. One of the many young children who work as child labourers here, Mohammed told me that he was a shoe shine boy but was worried that with his infected finger he would not be able to do his job. This was important to him as he said his parents fought all the time, his mother blaming his father for not providing food for the family.

A little girl nearby clung to her mother, her swollen belly and feet indicating acute malnutrition. The mother told me her daughter had been in hospital for two weeks but, now released, wouldn’t eat her ration of Plumpynut – the high-protein, peanut-based therapeutic food provided to acute malnutrition cases. But there was nothing else for her to eat.

The displaced population in Galkayo are either refugees from war, famine or both. People tell stories of failed crops, of whole flocks of sheep and goats dying from thirst and lack of feed. Many had fled Mogadishu after seeing family members killed in missile attacks or caught in cross fire. One woman arrived only days before, still in shock after learning that both her brother and father had been killed in the family home after staying behind to protect their window fittings and roof sheeting from looters during missile raids.  Another young woman showed me remnants of shrapnel in her hands and legs. Everyone here has run out of coping strategies. It is the end of the line.

In the midst of all this gloom stands the oasis of the Galkayo Medical Centre. Established by Dr Gaima in 2004, the hospital provides a huge range of health services including being the main referral hospital for fistula repair in Somalia.

Dr Gaima, until recently, was the only trained gynaecologist in Puntland. In contrast to so much of what I have seen, the hospital is spotless, the staff efficient and friendly. I tour wards of women suffering from all sorts of gynaecological problems; there are some rape victims, and many men who have suffered gunshot wounds or car accidents. In addition, Dr Gaima deals with many unique cases he says he never saw in his many years of practice in Italy – an indication, perhaps, of the total lack of health care most Somalis endure. As we do the morning round people reach out their hands to him. Dr Gaima has a kind and cheerful word for all his patients.

I am surprised to find out that Australia for UNHCR is the sole donor to the hospital as part of UNHCR’s ongoing support. In addition to this hospital, Australia for UNHCR also funds three health posts in the IDP camps and health services at Hadiya hospital. These services are the only free medical services provided to IDP’s, refugees, asylum seekers and poor locals.

To me the hospital represents a sliver of hope in this tough, dangerous country. I promise Dr Gaima and his dedicated staff that Australia for UNHCR will continue providing Australian donor support as long as we are able.

Naomi Steer

Please visit www.unrefugees.org.au/EastAfricaCrisis to find out how you can help UNHCR provide humanitarian assistance and food relief to those fleeing drought, famine and conflict in Somalia.

Celebrate World Refugee Day

60 years of international protection and assistance for refugees

2011 marks the 60^th anniversary of UNHCR and also of the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees – the key legal instrument underpinning the rights of refugees and the obligations of state parties to provide asylum.

Australia was one of the founding members of UNHCR and also one of the first states to sign up to the Convention. But the world has changed dramatically since the Convention was formulated.

Speaking at Australia for UNHCR’s World Refugee Day Breakfast last Friday, Australia for UNHCR’s Chair, John Denton, speculated about whether the “well of compassion” that led to Australia’s support for the Convention 60 years ago, had perhaps almost disappeared.

I would like to think not. But the ongoing debate about refugees and asylum seekers continues to underlie misconceptions about why people flee their homes and countries looking for safe refuge elsewhere.

This Refugee Week in Australia, SBS is screening a new three part series called Go Back to Where You Came From. According to the SBS publicity, Go Back to Where You Came From follows six ordinary Australians of varying ages and backgrounds, who agree to challenge their preconceived notions about refugees and asylum seekers by embarking on a confronting 25 day journey.

By chance I was in Kakuma Refugee Camp (one of the locations for the TV series) a week before their film crew arrived. Australia for UNHCR has funded a number of projects in Kakuma. Refugees and UNHCR staff wanted to know more about these other Australians who were soon to visit the camp. At first they were confused when I tried to explain what a ‘reality TV/ documentary’ was and that some of the Australians coming may not be very supportive of refugees.

However, after considering it, everyone was surprisingly open and positive. “Let them come, let them see how we live, how we have to survive here, and then they will change their mind.”

I don’t know how this experience did in fact change the way these Australians saw things (we will have to watch the series) but I am convinced that the more we are able to encourage direct contact and personal engagement with refugees then greater understanding and compassion will follow.

In line with this belief, on World Refugee Day Australia for UNHCR is launching a unique initiative aimed at linking up Australian students with refugees via Skype.

The project, Here & There, will be a world first, making possible a real-time video cross between an Australian school and a refugee school in Nakivale Refugee Settlement in south-west Uganda.

Using Skype technology, students in both countries will be able to connect their classrooms, ask each other questions and work together on a creative project to learn about each other’s lives. The project aims to raise awareness among young Australians about the issues facing refugees of their own age, many of whom have spent their childhoods in refugee camps.

It also aims to open new opportunities for refugees. As Gode Migerano, one of our guest speakers at our World Refugee Day Breakfast and himself a refugee said, “I would have loved to have this opportunity when I was living in a refugee camp as a young teenager. It would have opened the world to me.”

To find about more about the project and how you might be involved go to herethere.org.au