Haiti

By Gabriel Elizondo in Americas on January 17th, 2012

The Saint-Fluer family is living in a bathroom in a once abandoned hotel in the dusty Amazon border town of Brasileia, Brazil.

There is dad Wesley, his wife Angeline, and their five-month-old baby, Isaac.

The bathroom is about the size of a closet.

By Teymoor Nabili in Middle East on January 12th, 2011
Photo by EPA

Must step away from Haiti issues for a moment to highlight a couple of very interesting comments made about Iran this week.

First, the outgoing head of Israel's spy agency Mossad poured some cold water on Bibi's favourite trope, saying Israel should not attack Iran because "Iran won't reach its nuclear capabilities before 2015".  

Fox News described the comment as "sabotaging policy".

But perhaps more significant was a comment made later in the week by the new head of the IAEA.

Yukio Amano, the man hand picked by Washington to replace Mohamed el Baradei and turn the screws on Iran over its nuclear programme, has rather unexpectedly forgotten the key element of the approved script.

He told the German paper Der Spiegel:

Tags: Haiti, Mossad
By Teymoor Nabili in Americas on January 12th, 2011

It's open season on NGOs here in Haiti.

Tags: Haiti
By Gabriel Elizondo in Americas on January 8th, 2011
Ricardo Seitenfus during interview in Brasilia with Al Jazeera. Photo: Maria Elena Romero/Al Jazeera

You will be hard pressed to find a man anywhere more passionate about the plight of the Haitian people than Ricardo Seitenfus. The Brazilian professor of international affairs first went to Haiti in 1993 and the warmth of the Haitian people – combined with their immense struggle - has been drawing Seitenfus back to the island nation like a magnet ever since his first trip. Seitenfus has authored a book about the country, as well over a dozen other publications about international affairs. (His personal web site, in Portuguese, can be viewed by clicking here.) Seitenfus feels so connected to Haiti, he often doesn’t even realise he refers to the country as “we,” not as “they” or “it.”

Since 2009 Seitenfus has been working in Haiti on behalf of the Organization of American States.

By Rob Reynolds in Americas on July 11th, 2010

Leogane camp

If you ask, where did all the money for Haiti go, one answer is: not here.

When the earthquake rumbled up from the earth directly below Leogane, 20,000-30,000 people were killed, and 80 to 90 per cent of the town's concrete buildings were reduced to rubble.

And, chunk by chunk, shovelful by shovelful, that's some of the rubble that Saint-Fort Mackenson and the other members of his work crew are clearing away. 

Mackenson, a thin young man with a mop of plaited hair, pauses to lean on his shovel and wipe the sweat from his face.

“It's very hard work to to clear this debris,” he says in Kriyol, the French-related language of Haiti, “because we are using only our hands. We don't have any machinery. “

By John Terrett in Americas on March 31st, 2010
Photo by AFP

The United Nations made a call for Haiti on Wednesday and more than 130 countries and international organisations responded.

At a conference at UN HQ in New York City, international donors pledged more than $5bn over two years and a total of $9.9bn over three years and beyond, far exceeding expectations.

But there's scepticism in Haiti that the money will actually reach those who need it most. The conditions in the squalid, over-crowded camps in the capital have been made even worse by rains.

The tone at the UN donors conference, however, was more optimistic, with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon calling the effort a "wholesale national renewal" for Haiti.

Today the United Nations are united for Haiti. The international community has acted unanimously and for the long-term. This is the down payment Haiti needs for wholesale national renewal.

By Gabriel Elizondo in Americas on March 31st, 2010

Edmonde Roseline is a single mother of four. Before the earthquake she says she lived a normal life, waking up at 5 am everyday to get her kids ready for school. When the earthquake rocked Port au Prince she was in a busy marketplace. In her rush to escape the collapsing building, she fell in a manhole. There were bodies all around her, she recalls. She ran home, only to find her house totally collapsed and two of her children carrying their infant brother out from rubble.

By Gabriel Elizondo in Americas on March 29th, 2010
Photo by EPA

A research delegation from Amnesty International recently spent three weeks in Haiti examining the human rights conditions in the country.

The preliminary report findings, which can be downloaded here, is a much needed wake-up call to Haitian authorities, especially when it comes to the vulnerability of women and girls in the camps.

Consider this:

An 8-year-old girl alone in a tent raped at night.

A 15-year-old girl raped in a camp at night when she went outside to use the restroom.

Nineteen women raped in one camp alone.

These are just a few of the troubling findings by Amnesty International.

Authorities in Haiti must prioritise strengthening the police presence in camps, especially at night, including capacity to protect women and girls from sexual violence and to respond adequately to reported cases

By Kristen Saloomey in Americas on March 16th, 2010
Al Jazeera photo
University students have always been known for their activism, but I just met a group at Columbia University’s School of Public Administration (SIPA) who are using technology to take it to a new level.
 
They are volunteers who have been holed up in the basement of the school’s library, despite their exams, ever since an earthquake struck Chile.
 
They work in shifts from a tiny room without windows, amid half-eaten snacks and potato-chip wrappers, but they are able to have a direct impact on how aid is delivered to the people in Chile - thanks to an amazing new tool available right on their laptops.
 
By Rob Reynolds in Americas on February 10th, 2010
Photo by EPA

Demonstrators from a women's group rallied outside Haiti's ruined National Palace on Tuesday.

They said they are angry with their government, and with the United Nations, which they believe isn't doing enough to provide shelter.

"We don't have any tents! We haven't gotten help from anyone," one of the demonstrators told me.

Over and over, Haitians tell foreign visitors they have lost all faith in their government. Many say they are pinning their hopes on their superpower neighbour to the north.

"If the Americans stay, my life will change. Everyone's life will be changed. We want the Americans to take over the country, today," a man selling fruit outside the palace grounds told me.

"We want American people to be in charge, not the Haitians. If Haitians officials are in charge of the aid, they will only help their own families and friends."

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