By Chief editor, API

Their uniqueness: An elderly woman in her late 70s, a middle-aged woman in her late 30s and a youthful woman in her late 20s – all three working to empower women, freedom for all, human rights for all, and justice for all!

This year’s winners of the Nobel Peace Prize were women. The Nobel Peace Prize Committee decided to recognize the 3 women and enabled them to share the prize. Two from Liberia – a President and an activist, and the other from Yemen – an activist.

http://www.africanpress. Press Conference Oslo 10.12.2011: Right to left: Jagland, 3 women laureates,Lundestad

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Above: From the Press Conference in Oslo, Norway on 10th of December: From Right – Former Norwegian Prime Minister Thorbjørn Jagland (Nobel Peace Prize Committee Chairman), The Liberian women activist – now-turned Laureate, Yemeni activist – now-turned laureate, Liberian President Sirleaf now-turned laureate and Geir Lundestad – Director of the Nobel Institute.

They worked hard in their various fields and countries, they were recognized, they went and took the prestigious Nobel Peace Prizes on the 10th of December during a colourful ceremony in Oslo, Norway. Now they are called the “Laureates” which distinguishes them from other hard-working men and women world over.

http://www.africanpress.me - Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize Yemeni Activist during a press conference at the Nobel Institute, Oslo the 10th December 2011

This is a very good and gracious achievement and API wishes them well now and in their future roles and activities to better improve human rights and development in the world.

http://www.africanpress.me - Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize Liberian Activist during a press conference at the Nobel Institute, Oslo the 10th December 2011

Nobel Peace Prize opens many doors and those who have so far received it have managed to involve themselves in very important tasks that has become useful to many people. The laureates voices are listened to by world leaders and that alone helps them put their points across.

http://www.africanpress.me - Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize Liberian President Sirleaf with Geir Lundestand, Nobel Institute's Director During a press conference at the Institute, Oslo the 10th December 2011

It is, however, hard in some cases like now when the Yemeni laureate will start to champion a case to have the now deposed “through-peaceful-demontrations” Yemeni President who has relocated to Saudi Arabia, to be indicted by the International Criminal Court in the Hague to answer for many deaths that his troops committed under his watch during the struggle for change in his country.

http://www.africanpress.me - All the 3 winners listening to the media at the Press Conference in the Nobel Institute as they ask questions about their work that won them the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize, Oslo the 10th December 2011

It will take many leaders to listen to her and to say yes to the request to have the former President airlifted to the Hague where he will join former Presidents of Liberian President Taylor  and Ivory Coast’s Laurent Gbagbo who are now languishing in the ICC cells owing to their cruel rule and murder of innocent civilians as claimed by the ICC investigators.

Related article(s):

• Three women receive Nobel Peace Prize this year: A Concert 11th December 2011 in their honour in Oslo Spektrum has attracted good artists

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Dear friends,

Congratulations!

Exactly one hundred years ago, on the 14th of December 1911,

five brave Norwegians led by Roald Amundsen were the first people to reach the South Pole.

We are here today to honour these five men.

We are here to celebrate one of the most outstanding achievements of mankind.

And we are here to highlight the importance of this cold continent for the warming of the globe.

14th of December 1911 was a proud day for Norway.

A young nation that had gained its full independence only six years earlier.

The polar expeditions of Roald Amundsen helped to form our new national identity.

And the qualities that enabled Amundsen, Hassel, Bjaaland, Hanssen and Wisting to reach the South Pole, were precisely those that the young nation wanted to be recognised by:

Courage, determination and endurance.

Today is also the time to pay tribute to the bravery of Robert Scott and his men.

Scott and his team paid the ultimate prize.

But their names will forever be inscribed in Polar history.

They will always be remembered for their courage and determination in reaching one of the most unhospitable places on earth.

When Amundsen reached the Pole the team put up its tent,

and they named the camp “Polheim” – Home at the Pole.

Today the South Pole is “home” for many of you who are celebrating with us today.

More than 200 people have their daily work here at the Amundsen-Scott Base during the summer season. 

I would like to thank you and the US National Science Foundation for receiving us here with such warm hospitality in a frozen environment.

Some of you have experienced the hardship of skiing to the Pole. 

You have seen the beauty and the fascination of the Antarctic wilderness. 

And you have learned how challenging and unpredictable this frozen continent can be.

Today, Antarctica is a continent of international cooperation,

regulated by a well-functioning Antarctic Treaty,

where peace and stability,

environmental protection and international research, are at the heart of our joint efforts.

Researchers from all over the world are trying to discover the secrets of this vast continent. 

The Norwegian Troll Station is at the forefront of Norwegian research in Antarctica.

Norway and the United States have a long history of scientific cooperation.

The US – Norwegian Antarctic Scientific Traverse in 2007 made important findings.  

The Antarctic continent has been changing more rapidly in recent years than at any time in the past 800 years.

The loss of ice in Antarctica can have  dramatic global effects.

It is our common responsibility to save this planet for future generations.

Roald Amundsen, Robert Scott and their men were prepared to make an extraordinary effort in order to reach their ambitious goals.

We need to be prepared to do the same.

That is the best way to honour a century of science and exploration at the South Pole.

Thank you.

To mark the historic achievements a hundred years ago, it is now my privilege to unveil this bust of Roald Amundsen here at the South Pole, made by the Norwegian artist Håkon Anton Fagerås.

END

source Regjeringen.no/MFA-Norway

Today one hundred years have passed since Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his expedition became the first to reach the South Pole. In a speech at the South Pole Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg today honoured Amundsen and his men. He also paid tribute to the bravery of British explorer Robert F. Scott and his expedition.

“We are here to celebrate one of the most outstanding achievements of mankind. And we are here to highlight the importance of this cold continent in our efforts to understand the warming of the globe”, Prime Minister Stoltenberg said.

As part of Norway’s Nansen-Amundsen Year 2011, the Prime Minister today led a celebration at the Ceremonial South Pole, which is encircled by the flags of the 12 states that signed the Antarctic Treaty in 1959.

It was on 14 December 1911 that Roald Amundsen, Olav Bjaaland, Helmer Hanssen, Sverre Hassel and Oscar Wisting became the first to reach the South Pole.

“The polar expeditions of Roald Amundsen helped to form our new national identity. And the qualities that enabled Amundsen, Hassel, Bjaaland, Hanssen and Wisting to reach the South Pole, were precisely those that the young nation wanted to be recognised by: courage, determination and endurance”, the Prime Minister said.

“Scott and his team paid the ultimate prize. But their names will forever be inscribed in Polar history. They will always be remembered for their courage and determination in reaching one of the most inhospitable places on earth”, Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said.

End

source.MFA.Norway

Photo: Jefri Aries/IRIN

Slums like this one in Jakarta are vulnerable in expected flooding

BANGKOK,  - Indonesia’s disaster management officials warn severe flooding may hit the capital Jakarta this rainy season, as more than 26,000 health, public works and other emergency personnel mobilize nationwide in a larger-than-usual preparedness effort.

Heavy rainfall is predicted in January and February during the peak of the wet season, according to the country’s meteorology, climatology and geophysics agency (BMKG).

Several of Jakarta’s 40 sub-districts are expected to get more rainfall than usual, said Edy Junaidi of the Jakarta Provincial Agency for Disaster Management. Torrential rainfall may bring 400mm of rainfall per hour, some four times the average.

“There are no indications that flooding will be worse than 2007,” Junaidi told IRIN. “But it doesn’t mean we’re not anticipating.”

In February 2007 flooding, which lasted about 22 days, killed 57 people and forced 422,300 to leave their homes, of which 1,500 were destroyed. Total damage was estimated at nearly US$695 million, according to the UN.

One flood-prone community in south Jakarta’s Pondok Labu area was already inundated with more than 2m of water in late October.

Stalled dredging

Rubbish and debris in waterways hamper water flow during heavy rain, emergency workers said.

New construction in this province of about 10 million has altered the natural course of waterways, too, as urban settlements formed haphazardly along riverbanks.

Emergency officials are “pretty well geared up this time around” to respond to severe flooding, said Phillip Charlesworth, head of delegation for the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) in Jakarta.

But Charlesworth said the stalled World Bank-funded multimillion dollar project, known as the Jakarta Emergency Dredging Initiative, could have better prepared the city.

“The opportunity to do this work before the wet season has been lost,” he said.

Scheduled to begin three years ago, local media quoted city officials as saying the project is due to start in March 2012.

The capital’s principal waterways – 13 rivers and two flood canals – do not have the capacity to drain water quickly enough during heavy downpours, National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB) spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho told local media.

Meanwhile, other recent efforts to bolster Jakarta’s flood infrastructure include dredging rivers, cleaning 144 waterways, heightening tidal barriers in north Jakarta, building 26 reservoirs and installing pumps in 11 areas, Junaidi said.

Government officials have also distributed sandbags to people living in sub-districts susceptible to flooding, and 310 rubber boats and 537 mobile pumps are on hand.

es/pt/cb source http://www.irinnews.org

Photo: Whiteafrican/Flickr

Minerals mined in the eastern DRC are vital to the manufacture of consumer goods such as mobile phones

KINSHASA,  - In the Democratic Republic of Congo, two projects are under way to map mineral deposits in South Kivu province to facilitate traceability, amid increasing concerns in the international community that profits from the minerals trade are being illegally used to fund armed groups in the east.

The chaotic management that has plagued the mining sector since the 1980s is, however, proving a sticking point in the process. The survival of thousands of artisanal miners is one of the humanitarian issues at stake in this project.

A guide to reforming the mining sector in the east, produced by researchers at NGO Ipis, explains that “despite calls for a map to be drawn up from the UN expert group in its December 2008 report, there is currently no reliable map available. The volatile security situation on the ground would mean that the map would have to be regularly updated.”

Data is urgently needed. Although it is not yet clear how it will be enforced, the Dodd-Franck Act, passed by the US Congress in July 2010, contains a provision allowing only minerals that have been certified “DRC conflict free” to enter the US. The European Union is considering similar legislation.

According to Sara Geenen, a PhD student at the University of Antwerp, who specializes in the South Kivu artisanal mining sector, traders are “willing to back a certification and traceability system, provided they reap some sort of benefit from it, such as a tax reduction”.

The International Conference for the Great Lakes Region, the UN Group of Experts, and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development are unanimous in calling for the mapping and categorization process to move as quickly as possible to avoid an embargo, which could inflame an already volatile region.

Two complementary projects

The Kinshasa Group, comprising the UN Stabilization Mission (MONUSCO) and the German Federal Institute for Geo-Science and Natural Resources (BGR), is behind one of the initiatives. Michel Liete, head of the South Kivu province mining division, explains that “the aim of this project is to categorize the mining sites surrounding the 16 future mineral trading centres, which will coordinate artisanal mining within a 25km radius. These mining sites will be certified based on human rights criteria covering the presence of armed groups, illegal taxes, women’s rights, and the presence of children under the age of 15.”

Only one trading centre in Mugogo (in Walungo) has so far been built, and the surrounding sites have been classed as “clean” or “dirty”, according to their compliance with the specifications. These classifications, which are due to be communicated by Kinshasa, are still confidential.

Photo: Sasha Lezhnev/Enoughproject

Gold rush: There is an urgent need to map mineral resources in eastern DRC

A separate initiative, led by Ipis and financed by the Belgian Foreign Affairs Ministry, the US government and the World Bank, viaPROMINES, will continue for 18 months and cover all of South Kivu. Specifically, it will aim to map artisanal mining sites, transportation routes, and mineral trading points, reflecting the security and human rights situation on the ground, using the Geographic Information System (GIS) programme. The aim is to gradually hand over control to the Mining Cadastre (registry) as it builds up human and technical resources.
In the eye of the storm

Artisanal miners can only work in seven mining zones in South Kivu (two in Kalehe, two in Mwenga and three in Shabunda). According to Gabriel Kamundula, a researcher at the Applied Development Economics Laboratory at the Catholic University of Bukavu, “the number of artisanal miners exceeds the capacities of these seven sites”. In March 2011, without taking into account “independent” miners, the regional mining department registered 52,000 in mineral cooperatives.

Kamundula explains that, “in order to alleviate social pressure on the government, the region is trying to collaborate with companies present on the ground, such as the Canadian multinational BANRO, by asking them to tolerate the presence of artisanal miners on their sites for an agreed timeframe, with guarantees in place to ensure the practice does not continue beyond this fixed period”.

However, Janvier Kilosho, a researcher at the South Kivu mining sector management centre of expertise (CEGEMI), thinks that the Congolese government did not want to support and formalize artisanal mining activity, deeming industrial operations “more favourable and more transparent”.

The social stakes of the mapping project are high. In cases where the Mining Cadastre decides to disqualify artisanal sites that do not meet the criteria, the miners will be pushed out into the cold. Their only hope is a dormant licence.

Cleaning up

Past oversights are also coming back to haunt the mapping projects. According to Kamundula, “Many problems have arisen from concessions being granted by Kinshasa not corresponding to the situation on the ground; it isn’t uncommon for a single concession to have been allocated twice. Moreover, some GPS coordinates correspond to locations in Lake Kivu.”

The Mining Cadastre is not yet operational, and despite assurances from Martin Kabwelulu, the Mining Minister, that “blood minerals no longer exist in the Democratic Republic of Congo; the business climate is favourable and foreign investors no longer have anything to fear”, Kinshasa is reluctant to disclose the results of its site qualifications, which will either displease the artisanal miners in the east, or the industrial sector and international community.

Faced with such a predicament, the government is having to adopt a long-term vision to clean up a situation that is far from being resolved. Mapping the mining sites is the first step to increasing transparency in the sector and ensuring revenue from the mineral deposits does not go towards financing armed groups.

cm/mw source http://www.irrinnews.org

Photo: UNAIDS

Swaziland’s shortages of HIV drugs, testing kits and lab supplies has given rise to a new generation of activists, including discontented nurses

MBABANE,  - A new wave of HIV activism is rising in Swaziland as people living with HIV take to the streets in protest, many for the first time in their lives, over continued shortages of antiretroviral (ARV) treatment.

Swaziland ‘s deepening financial crisis is taking a toll on service delivery, and the country is experiencing an unprecedented number of protests over issues such as school closures and a lack of HIV treatment. While Africa’s last absolute monarchy does not allow formal political opposition to operate, a new brand of HIV activism may be taking hold as anger mounts over a lack of ARVs.

“People living with HIV and AIDS are more politically active,” said Thandi Nkambule, director of the Swaziland Network for People with HIV and AIDS (SWANEPHA), an umbrella body. He noted that there are similarities between Swaziland’s newfound HIV activism and established movements in neighbouring South Africa.

“The leaders of the HIV support groups are joining the marches because they know that [government] leadership lacks the political will to meet the needs of people living with HIV and AIDS.” About a quarter of all adult Swazis are living with HIV and about 47,000 patients nationally were on ARVs at the end of 2009, according to UNAIDS.

Shortages of HIV programme supplies in Swaziland began making headlines in mid-2011. Media reports have largely attributed stock-outs to reduced revenues from the Southern Africa Customs Union (SACU), but the country also opted not to apply for funding in Round 10 from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. Instead, it chose to assume financial responsibility for HIV treatment itself, at a time when SACU revenues were already projected to decline. Domestic funding has proved insufficient to back this decision.

Rising voices on the ground

Thandi Khumalo has been on ARVs for a year. Earlier in 2011 she took part in her first trade union protest as part of a “Week of Global Action” to press for political reform in Swaziland.

“The clinic where I go has never run out of ARVs, like some other places that have been hit by the government financial crisis, but I know people in our support group who have experienced interruptions,” she said during a demonstration.

“I have never been involved in politics… [but] we all live in fear that this will happen to us – that is why I am doing this political march. Something has to change in the way this country is run, or we will die,” Khumalo told IRIN/PlusNews. “This is survival for me.”
The Ministry of Health has disputed allegations that Swaziland is experiencing sporadic shortages of ARVs, and Health Minister Themba Xaba recently said anyone experiencing stock outs should contact him personally. The minister also alleged that pro-democracy groups have used allegations of ARV stock-outs for political gain, but activists disagree.

“The shortages of medicines and basic supplies in hospitals are real – that is why the nurses staged a protest action this year,” said SWANEPHA member Solomon Thwala, who added that SWANEPHA members have been verifying and reporting stock-outs that the government continues to deny.

In August the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) gave the country US$7 million in emergency funding, but this was only for first-line ARVs. Swaziland now has a buffer stock of first-line ARVs that should last until April 2012.

Prudence Simelane, a garment worker, also joined demonstrations to protest shortages of the drugs that she says have given Swazis hope, but which she feels can no longer be entrusted to government. “Swazis never cared about AIDS – they were told they would die if they got HIV and there was nothing they could do – but now we can live with HIV.”

She surprised herself by joining in recent demonstrations. “We have hope because of the ARVs – people are thinking about their lives, and about the future,” Simelane said. “That is why we are so frightened – because we can’t trust government to keep us supplied with drugs.”

jh/llg/he source http://www.irinnews.or
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