In 1985, American analyst Jonathan Pollard was arrested for sending classified information to the Israeli government. He was given a life sentence, marking the first time in U.S. history that a life sentence was given for spying for an ally of the United States.
Now, Israeli President, Shimon Peres, is traveling to Washington, D.C. where the issue of Pollard’s release will be front and center. Officially, Peres is going to receive the Congressional Gold Medal as well as the 2014 Lantos Human Rights Prize. In addition, he has promised to meet with President Obama about the prospect of releasing Pollard, who has been imprisoned in America for nearly three decades.
One of the organizers of the movement to free Pollard, Efi Lahav, implored President Peres to lobby President Obama during his trip, stating that, “We believe your upcoming visit to the U.S. is the most serious opportunity yet to release Jonathan Pollard.”
Previous talks to release the convicted spy have fallen through at the last minute, and this trip may prove to be the final opportunity to strike a deal. Pollard is up for parole in 2015. His release could be part of a larger prisoner swap in which Palestinian prisoners would be released by Israel.
However, those talks fell short in the past. Instead of using Pollard as a bargaining chip, President Obama could also free him as a humanitarian gesture that would reaffirm ties with Israel. Whatever Obama decides, it is certain that the issue of Pollard’s release will be broached by Peres.
The day before Peres left for the U.S., he met with Pollard’s wife where he claimed that, “It is a national responsibility to work to free Pollard, I will speak to the President of the United States on behalf of the people of Israel. I intend to do this during my meetings in Congress and at the White House.”
On top of that, Peres will also deliver a speech to Congress, thus giving him another opportunity to exert influence in Washington.
While Peres will no doubt be pleased with his prestigious awards, the focus of the trip will certainly be Pollard.
Pollard was once a candidate for a CIA graduate fellowship, but was turned down due to a history of emotional instability and drug usage. He eventually landed a position as an analyst at the Navy’s Anti-terrorist Alert Center where Pollard had access to a wealth of classified intelligence information.
As a lifelong sympathizer of Israel who had dreams of eventually emigrating, he was easily talked into becoming an Israeli spy. In 1984, Pollard was contacted by a family friend in Israel who set up a meeting with his eventual handler. Shortly after, Pollard began handing over documents in bulk.
During the course of his 17-month spying career, Pollard leaked over 800 highly classified documents.
After a co-worker noticed Pollard accessing classified documents without authorization, the FBI became suspicious of Pollard. Spooked, Pollard attempted to seek refuge at the Israeli embassy in D.C., but he was turned away. He was arrested shortly after.
What happens next remains to be seen. Over the next few days, Pollard could be released in a deal that would help to deescalate the Israeli Palestinian conflict. President Obama could also opt for the humanitarian route and free Pollard with no strings attached. Whatever happens, Pollard’s usefulness as a bargaining chip is quickly running out, and President Peres’ trip to D.C. will likely be a decisive turning point on the matter.
While the official purpose of the visit is to honor Peres’ past accomplishments as a human rights leader, the true reason for the trip could have humanitarian implications that extend far into the future.
– Sam Hillestad
Sources: Jewish Press, CNN, USA Today, Jerusalem Post
Photo: The Algemeiner
Projeta Brasil: Fighting Child Exploitation
Coinciding with the World Against Child Labor Day, the 2014 FIFA World Cup is taking place in Brazil this year and it is important to note the link between these two events. Although children in Brazil below the age of 16 are not supposed to work, about 3 million children below that age are currently subjects of child labor. In 2013, 10,668 violations of children’s rights were largely registered on the Brazilian government’s Secretariat of Human Rights hotline.
During the World Cup, children will be on break from school, making the opportunity to become victims of exploitation and abuse even greater than normal. The Brazilian government, however, has begun to take steps toward improving the situation. In an attempt to preemptively respond to what could be an increased period of abuse by child labor, the government has been raising public awareness, expanding its police force and has supported and approved legislation that categorizes any sort of sexual exploitation of children or adolescents as a “heinous crime,” meaning punishments for these types of crimes will be more severe than ever.
Additionally, in order to address the problem even further, UNICEF just developed an app called Projeta Brasil. Projeta Brasil, also partnered with organizations such as Save the Dream and the International Centre for Sport Security, allows smartphone users to immediately report any instances of child labor or child abuse they may see. The report immediately alerts local authorities about the location, time and circumstances in which the event was witnessed. It also provides the chance for victims themselves to report instances of exploitation. While the app primarily acts as a reporting tool, it also serves to raise awareness about various forms of child exploitation to look out for during the World Cup.
The app puts the power to help in the hands of both Brazilians and tourists alike, and can be downloaded in various languages, such as Portuguese, English and Spanish. If you’d like to download or learn more about the app, you can find more information here.
– Jordyn Horowitz
Sources: UNICEF Connect, Huffington Post, Global March, Projeta Brasil
Photo: WordPress
5 Ways Hunger Hurts Learning
Education is one of the very few opportunities for poor people living in impoverished, underdeveloped countries. Basic education programs provide children with the skills necessary to acquire employment, as well as basic knowledge pertaining to health, hygiene and disease prevention. And yet, according to the U.N., 250 million children — even those who have spent at least four years in school — are not able to adequately read, write or count.
While many factors play into this staggering statistic, hunger is a key culprit when it comes to the millions of uneducated children worldwide. Here’s how hunger hurts learning:
1. Children who are malnourished suffer up to 160 days of illness each year, which means 160 missed school days.
2. Vitamin A deficiency, which is directly linked to malnutrition, is the leading cause of preventable childhood blindness in developing countries; The World Health Organization estimates that each year, 500,000 children go blind as a result of vitamin A deficiency. Blindness makes it increasingly difficult for children to learn alongside their peers.
3. Malnutrition intensifies the symptoms and effects of diseases, such as malaria and measles. Children who are unable to combat these diseases lack the physical capacity to attend school and learn.
4. Malnutrition stunts not only physical, but also mental development, in young children, preventing them from reaching their full human and socio-economic potential as well as their potential to learn.
5. One out of five children born from an under-nourished mother is born with low birth weight. Low birth weight in children is linked to mental retardation, learning disabilities and blindness, all of which may prevent a child from receiving an education.
Hungry children suffer not only from malnourishment—and the litany of other harms it causes—but also from the incredible disadvantage of not being physically well enough to learn. Global education and global hunger are not mutually exclusive issues. A brand-new school with ample resources in Tanzania, for example, is useless without a classroom full of healthy children who are ready to learn.
Expecting Malaria-infected children to attend school and absorb information from excellent basic education programs is also impractical. We have a global responsibility not only to support education programs in third-world countries, but also to ensure that children are able to take advantage of the incredible opportunities education holds for them.
Due to the difficulty of learning while hungry and ill, in order to provide effective education, it is crucial that aid programs also address the global health and hunger crises in impoverished countries.
– Elizabeth Nutt
Sources: World Hunger, UN.org, UN.org, Hellen Keller International
Photo: Your Mind Your Body
Zambia Sees Positive Water Delivery
As 2014 nears its halfway point, the capital of Zambia recently reported positive water delivery to its residents inhabiting much of the city.
The Lusaka Water and Sewerage Company, the water company that services the nation’s capital, promises a number of additional water projects to be undertaken in the months and years ahead.
“Now it is time to offer solutions because we believe that only through actions will we be judged and our actions can now tell a positive story of how we are transforming the city of Lusaka with improved service delivery,” LWSC public relations manager, Topsy Sikalinda, said.
Lusaka’s Strategic Revenue Improvement Report Programme noted the need for corporate and residential areas to see improved water reticulation, the commissioning of boreholes and an increase in water supply throughout the city.
Other incomplete projects include water supply upgrades in the surrounding parts of the city. Surrounding cities and areas expect to increase yields of cubic meters of water per day through the installation of additional infrastructure.
While Lusaka and its surrounding areas have witnessed positive water services, other parts of the country continue to struggle with their water infrastructure and services.
Recently, Devolution Trust Fund manager, Sam Ng’onga, stated that nearly 2 million Zambians inhabiting low-income housing do not have access to adequate drinking water. A larger number of Zambians do not have access to legitimate sanitation services.
According to UNICEF, nearly 25 percent of Zambian schools do not have access to clean water and sanitation facilities. Among both genders, the primary education completion rate is only 72 percent.
Even though the number of Zambians who have access to water and sanitation services continues to increase, the number will need to climb further in order for the nation to meet its goal of supplying nearly all of its residents with consumable drinking water in the coming years.
– Ethan Safran
Sources: allAfrica, UNICEF
Genetically Engineered Bananas Could Save Lives
Deficiency in Vitamin A causes preventable blindness and an increased chance of disease and death for children across the globe in developing countries. Approximately 250 million preschool-aged children are deficient in Vitamin A. Between 250,000 and 500,000 children become blind every year due to Vitamin A deficiencies and around half of these children die within a year after becoming blind.
Recently, scientists at Queensland University of Technology have been working on genetically engineering a banana that will help prevent deficiencies in Vitamin A.
Genetically modified foods are foods that do not occur naturally but, instead, are created by scientists altering their genetic material. Genetically modified foods have been used to increase food production by making plants larger or making them more resistant to disease. Genetically modified foods could be used to increase the amount of nutrients in food — such as with Vitamin A-concentrated bananas — decreasing food allergies or making foods easier to grow.
While recognizing the advantages to global health that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) would offer, many are worried about the possible negative side effects. Critics have noted the lack of research about future health issues that may arise due to the consumption of genetically modified foods. More research over time would be necessary for scientists to weigh their advantages and disadvantages.
These genetically engineered bananas have an increased level of beta-carotene in them. Beta-carotene is then converted to Vitamin A by the body after being ingested.
In the past few years, similar research has been done to create “golden rice”— rice with increased levels of beta-carotene. Critics have also been skeptical about the risks involved with this project.
If the bananas are effective in increasing Vitamin A levels, the scientists will work to begin distributing these genetically engineered bananas in Uganda by 2020 to begin decreasing the rates of Vitamin A deficiency-related diseases, blindness and death.
– Lily Tyson
Sources: The Guardian, HealthLine, PHG Foundation, WHO
Photo: Carnarvon
Arsenic Poisoning in Rural Asian Waters
Reawakening the global health problem of unclean, polluted drinking water, rural Asian villages have been plagued with arsenic-ridden water. Most of these rural villages are near mines which leak and pollute local water sources with the carcinogen arsenic. In the past decade, the Heshan village in China has seen nearly 20 percent of the population get cancer from the polluted water.
The arsenic has been traced back to runoff and residue from a local mine that was closed in 2011. The 190 living cancer patients have petitioned the local governments for monetary compensation and aid, but the $1,600 reimbursement is insufficient for even one round of chemotherapy or radiation. For many of these poor rural villagers, the cancer diagnosis from arsenic poisoning is nothing less than a death sentence because of the unaffordable cost of treatment.
Tests of the ground water have resulted in arsenic amounts 15 times the safe amount of arsenic. The water is so toxic that many of the agricultural staples are not viable in the region, stripping these people of their livelihood and reinforcing the cycle of poverty in the area.
Similar cases have been reported throughout China and India. With water security being of the utmost importance, cancer patterns have sprung up around villages with arsenic in the water. Local medical professionals have denied the correlation between the high arsenic levels and the cancer hotspots, despite the fact that arsenic has been recognized by many health institutions as a known carcinogen.
The lack of transparency between health officials and the villagers coupled with insufficient cleaning methods has resorted in the outbreaks of cancer caused by arsenic. The toxicity of the element, both for humans and agriculture, has stunted the regional economies and has restricted the employment pool. A needless tragedy, the arsenic-laden drinking waters have destroyed families and the economies of the rural villages afflicted by the toxic water.
– Kristin Ronzi
Sources: American Cancer Society, Reuters, Times of India
Photo: Trip Advisor
The World’s First Hookworm Vaccine
One-third of children and women living below the World Bank’s poverty line are infected with hookworm today, which often causes moderate to severe anemia. Hookworm and other Neglected Tropical Diseases, or NTDs, disproportionately affect the poorer Islamic countries such as Indonesia, Bangladesh, Mali, Nigeria and others in North Africa and the Middle East.
Children and pregnant women are by far the most drastically affected by this disease. Children with long-standing blood loss from hookworm often experience sufficient mental and motor development delays. They can actually lose IQ points as well. These detrimental effects undoubtedly follow them into adulthood, making productivity more difficult.
The blood loss caused by hookworm may affect women in labor, making their chance of death much higher. Additionally, the baby is more likely to be born prematurely or with low birth weight. This makes those babies less likely to survive, contributing to the child mortality rate.
Additionally, the link between hookworms and anemia is a large concern because of its relation to disabilities. Anemia accounted for 8.8 percent of the total disability of the world in 2010. Today, children under 5 years old and women of all ages still hold the heaviest burden.
Fortunately, the Sabin Vaccine Institute’s Product Development Partnership is developing the world’s first hookworm vaccine for human use. The Sabin Institute was established in 2000 with funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and is the only Product Development Partnership in the world working to develop a vaccine for human hookworm infections.
The institute is receiving support from the European Commission FP7 program and uniting professionals from around the world to build research. This global consortium has been coined HOOKVAC and includes members from the Netherlands, the United States, Belgium, England, Germany and Gabon. This project aims not only to perfect the manufacturing process of the vaccine, but also to increase and share research on NTDs.
The first clinical testing of the vaccine will take place in Sub-Saharan Africa once it is ready. Gabon’s Lamberene Research Centre will lead clinical testing in adults and children in Gabon, a region plagued with hookworm.
The vaccine is being called the “anti-poverty” vaccine due to its vast potential to lower child mortality rates, save mothers in labor and improve health conditions for agricultural workers, who are the backbone of many poorer economies.
The vaccine, as of now, is intended only for use in the poorest regions of the world, where hookworm thrives. This means that the product will likely not be sold commercially by pharmaceutical companies, but will remain in the nonprofit sector with HOOKVAC.
The project will hopefully conduct trials in the coming years and bring health relief to millions, while contributing to the united fight against global poverty.
– Cambria Arvizo
Sources: Huffington Post, Sabin Vaccine Institute, American Society of Hematology
Photo: The Guardian
The Fight for Feminism in China
In an attempt to raise awareness about the overall inequality women in China face, various groups have been performing an assortment of “stunts” in the hopes to provoke a positive response in favor of feminism in China.
Within the past few years, displays have included women wearing wedding dresses covered in red in an effort to stand up to domestic violence, disapproving of the lack of female facilities by participating in “Occupy the Men’s Toilets” and shaving their heads to address the more demanding requirements women need to meet to attend college.
While feminism is not as widespread in China as some of these activists would like, it is by no means a new movement. In the 19th and 20th centuries, women such as Lin Zongsu fought for female suffrage and women such as Qiu Jin wrote and spoke out about the practice of footbinding and the limited education of young girls.
Li Mizai explains to a Guardian reporter that despite the plethora of past feminist figures the activists use for inspiration, “gender discrimination is getting worse.”
Only two women serve on the politiburo and “the proportion of women on the party’s 200-strong central committee has slipped to less than 5 percent, lower than in Mao’s day.” Less than a fifth of land use contacts are in or include the name of the wife, and in 2011 rights to marital property were legally reduced. Moreover, the percentage of urban working women has decreased from 77 percent to 61 percent in the past two decades.
Part of the discrimination starts at birth, and while the gender gap has decreased in the past two years, there are still 118 male births for every 100 female births.
Interviewee Xiao Men comments that although sex discrimination is illegal in the work place, companies are unlikely to receive legal punishment for such actions. She comments that “when women face discrimination they don’t fight against it because they weren’t raised this way, and even if they try to, they don’t know how to do it. I think all women know something’s wrong, but they don’t know what it is or why.”
Activists, however, have not been discouraged thus far, and keep advocating for women’s equality across the country by trying to make women recognize their right to advocate for themselves.
– Jordyn Horowitz
Sources: The Guardian 1, The Guardian 2, The Guardian 3, Wall Street Journal
Photo: Global Times
Using EDM to Fight Global Poverty
Philanthropist Hugh Evans, co-founder of the Oaktree Foundation and Global Poverty Project, organized an electronic dance music festival on June 26 named the Thank You Festival. This benefit show is working to engage the millennial generation in the fight against global poverty.
The show will feature one of the most popular electronic DJs in the world, Tiesto, as well as Above and Beyond and a Maryland local electronic DJ by the name of Alvin Risk. The festival will utilize a 15-foot inflatable toilet to bring awareness to water and sanitation issues around the world. Electronic dance festivals, which are commonly associated with drug use and experimentation, may not seem an ideal place to speak about global poverty.
However, Evans notes that to reach the millennial generation it has to be done through the people they listen to, in this case through electronic dance artists. His previous work with the Make Poverty History concert in Melbourne, Australia was highly successful. The concert, which occurred simultaneously with the G20 meeting, was responsible for Australia doubling its foreign aid efforts. Other concerts Evans has been involved with include the 2012 Global Citizen Festival for which Evans secured the Great Lawn in Central Park, N.Y. The New York festival also occurred simultaneously with another international meeting, this time of the United Nations General Assembly.
The concert raised $1.3 billion in programs to aid the global poor. The June 26 concert is aimed at getting the United States to continue its aid efforts for child survival services as well as double the U.S. government’s funding of the Global Partnership for Education, which would total $40 million. Previous concert efforts of Evans have been associated with rock and pop music. This will be his first effort utilizing electronic dance music.
The festival will feature DJs, Evans and top U.S. Foreign Aid officials who will speak about the cause of eliminating extreme poverty and encourage fans to get involved. Tiesto expressed in an email that the festival provides a unique possibility to produce effective change. “I know that my fans are thoughtful, generous and caring and this festival is a great opportunity to show Washington D.C. what our community is really about.” The festival, which is partnered with Club Glow, the World Childhood Foundation, The Global Poverty Project and Global Citizen, will begin at 4 p.m. on June 26 at Merriweather Pavilion in Columbia, Md.
– Christopher Kolezynski
Sources: EDM, Spin, Washington Post
Photo: Oh So Fresh
Global Foreign Aid Reaches $22 Billion
The Development Initiatives research group reports that the total amount the world’s governments and private organizations spent on foreign assistance rose to $22 billion in 2013, the highest ever recorded. Private aid was $5.6 billion, an increase of over $1 billion from 2012, while government aid was $16.4 billion, about $3 billion higher than the amounts spent in the previous five years.
Most governments in developed countries considerably increased their international assistance spending last year. The United States in particular spent 18 percent more than it did in 2012 and contributed the most money of any country at $4.7 billion. Other countries, like Brazil and China, saw 97 percent and 84 percent drops in spending respectively, but most, including the United Kingdom, Japan, Canada and Germany, as well as the European Union governmental organizations, increased their foreign aid investments.
Why did governments increase their foreign aid spending so suddenly? Much of the aid increases occurred because of worsening violent conflicts and natural disasters around the globe. Much of the private aid increases went to help rebuild the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan, while other aid went to help victims of clashes in South Sudan,the Central African Republic and Syria.
Syria in particular has received enormous support to help victims of the civil war. According to the World Bank, global aid to Syria increased from $335 million in 2011 to $1.67 billion in 2012, and that number continues to rise as more countries offer help. Turkey was the third-highest foreign aid donor after the U.S. and the UK because of its $1.6-billion effort to care for Syrian refugees. Even Kuwait, a small country not known for its foreign aid budget, raised so much money for Syria that its aid spending increased by 2,315 percent in 2013.
Despite this recent surge in funding, governments tended to concentrate their foreign aid spending on specific countries. The World Bank found that Afghanistan, the country receiving the most aid, got nearly $7 billion in 2012, but many countries in need received substantially less. “Just under a quarter of the total international humanitarian response went to the top five recipient countries, while other countries such as Nepal, Myanmar and Algeria continued to be de-prioritized,” said Dan Coppard, Development Initiatives’ director of research. World Bank data shows that Algeria received less than $200 million in 2012, while Nepal and Myanmar got less than $1 billion.
What does this new spending mean for long-term foreign aid policy? On one hand, it demonstrates that nations are willing to come together and offer help to suffering people. However, they responded to immediately visible natural disasters and conflicts, and there were many countries in need that received very little help. The desire to give foreign aid exists, but advocates must work to make issues requiring international development spending more visible and relevant to governments and their constituents.
– Ted Rappleye
Sources: The Guardian, The World Bank
Photo: NY Times
President Peres Hopes for Freedom for Pollard
In 1985, American analyst Jonathan Pollard was arrested for sending classified information to the Israeli government. He was given a life sentence, marking the first time in U.S. history that a life sentence was given for spying for an ally of the United States.
Now, Israeli President, Shimon Peres, is traveling to Washington, D.C. where the issue of Pollard’s release will be front and center. Officially, Peres is going to receive the Congressional Gold Medal as well as the 2014 Lantos Human Rights Prize. In addition, he has promised to meet with President Obama about the prospect of releasing Pollard, who has been imprisoned in America for nearly three decades.
One of the organizers of the movement to free Pollard, Efi Lahav, implored President Peres to lobby President Obama during his trip, stating that, “We believe your upcoming visit to the U.S. is the most serious opportunity yet to release Jonathan Pollard.”
Previous talks to release the convicted spy have fallen through at the last minute, and this trip may prove to be the final opportunity to strike a deal. Pollard is up for parole in 2015. His release could be part of a larger prisoner swap in which Palestinian prisoners would be released by Israel.
However, those talks fell short in the past. Instead of using Pollard as a bargaining chip, President Obama could also free him as a humanitarian gesture that would reaffirm ties with Israel. Whatever Obama decides, it is certain that the issue of Pollard’s release will be broached by Peres.
The day before Peres left for the U.S., he met with Pollard’s wife where he claimed that, “It is a national responsibility to work to free Pollard, I will speak to the President of the United States on behalf of the people of Israel. I intend to do this during my meetings in Congress and at the White House.”
On top of that, Peres will also deliver a speech to Congress, thus giving him another opportunity to exert influence in Washington.
While Peres will no doubt be pleased with his prestigious awards, the focus of the trip will certainly be Pollard.
Pollard was once a candidate for a CIA graduate fellowship, but was turned down due to a history of emotional instability and drug usage. He eventually landed a position as an analyst at the Navy’s Anti-terrorist Alert Center where Pollard had access to a wealth of classified intelligence information.
As a lifelong sympathizer of Israel who had dreams of eventually emigrating, he was easily talked into becoming an Israeli spy. In 1984, Pollard was contacted by a family friend in Israel who set up a meeting with his eventual handler. Shortly after, Pollard began handing over documents in bulk.
During the course of his 17-month spying career, Pollard leaked over 800 highly classified documents.
After a co-worker noticed Pollard accessing classified documents without authorization, the FBI became suspicious of Pollard. Spooked, Pollard attempted to seek refuge at the Israeli embassy in D.C., but he was turned away. He was arrested shortly after.
What happens next remains to be seen. Over the next few days, Pollard could be released in a deal that would help to deescalate the Israeli Palestinian conflict. President Obama could also opt for the humanitarian route and free Pollard with no strings attached. Whatever happens, Pollard’s usefulness as a bargaining chip is quickly running out, and President Peres’ trip to D.C. will likely be a decisive turning point on the matter.
While the official purpose of the visit is to honor Peres’ past accomplishments as a human rights leader, the true reason for the trip could have humanitarian implications that extend far into the future.
– Sam Hillestad
Sources: Jewish Press, CNN, USA Today, Jerusalem Post
Photo: The Algemeiner