Don't Call Them "Do-Nothing"

Yesterday, 5 U.S. Congressmen were arrested outside the Sudanese Embassy while protesting President Bashir's crimes against humanity. Don't say Congress is completely useless!

Reps. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), Lynn Woolsey (D-Petaluma), John Lewis (D-Ga.) and Donna Edwards (D-Md.) along with three activists were arrested on charges of civil disobedience by Secret Service and were released a few hours later after each paying a $100 fine.

U.S. Rep. John Lewis, center, is led away in handcuffs by a Secret Service officer during an act of civil disobedience to protest the Sudanese government's ongoing genocide in Darfur on Monday outside the Sudan embassy in Washington, DC.

After reading statements calling on President Obama to pressure the global community into action regarding Darfur, the congressmen and activists crossed the yellow tape and refused to move during the large and reportedly peaceful demonstration, which is what lead to their arrests.

"I hope that is very clear to our administration and to international communities that violence in Darfur must end," said Representative Woolsey. Bashir , she added, "must allow the NGOs back into the country and admit he has only worsened the crisis in Darfur."

It has been over two months now since the International Criminal Court issued its arrest warrent for Bashir and since 13 major international relief and aid groups were expelled from the country. This has left over 1 million people at risk and since these events not much has happened. Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times reported on his blog yesterday that there is talk of Sudan appeasement by the Obama administration, who appears to be taking the "let's be friends" approach to the Darfur crisis and Bashir.

The fact that nothing has been done by anyone in any country around the world is pretty dispicable. The confict and genocide in Darfur began in 2003 about the same time as the Iraq war began. It has been five years of silence by an international community that seems to have plenty to say about Iraq.

Where is the outrage? Where is the humanity? Where is the responsibility?

Photo credit: Tim Sloan / AFP/Getty Images

"Well, being a woman is God's creation"

In my role as the awards program assistant at the Global Health Council I have had the opportunity to review close to 100 media entries for our 2009 Excellence in Media awards. Many of these nominations were first rate, and all deserve recognition for promoting and highlighting global health issues. There are a few that particularly stand-out for me this year, including two different films that deal with women's health issues in Ethiopia: Child Brides by SafeHands for Mothers and A Walk to Beautiful by Engel Entertainment.

I also recently came across the film project, Not Yet Rain by Ipas, which also deals with women's health in Ethiopia and I thought I would highlight these excellent films and the message they are delivering.

Child Brides opens with the marriage ceremony of Wube-Enat who is 10 years old to Abebe, who is 14. Child marriages are illegal in Ethiopia (where the legal age is 18) but according to SafeHands for Mothers, 14% of girls are married by age 10 and 39% by age 14. The majority of child brides will have sex before their first menstruation and often bare children at extremely early ages. Young girls who have children at such an age often suffer from obstetric fistulas (more on that below), which can lead to rejection by her husband and to be ostracized by the community. She also no longer attends school, another crucial element for sustainable development.





In order to get this video out to much of Ethiopia's rural population (77 million Ethiopians live in the rural areas), SafeHands for Mothers partnered with the Ethiopian Ministry of Health and Family Guidance Association of Ethiopia. How did they play the DVDs? With portable solar powered DVD player backpacks of course! SafeHands teamed up with Dulas, Ltd., which designed the technology to bring the film directly to the communities.

A Walk to Beautiful deals with the results of complications from child-birth, obstetric fistulas (and, in fact, sexual violence can cause these as well). Single and double obstetric fistulas are what the World Health Organization describes as the result of neglected child birth. These fistula, a small hole between the rectum and/or bladder and vagina is the result of prolonged, obstructed labor. The resulting fistulas cause uncontrollable leakage of urine and fesses and these women are often shunned by their husbands and their communities. Over two million women world wide suffer from fistula and another 100,000 cases are added each year. A Walk to Beautiful follows five women and their journey to re-enter their society.



Finally, Not Yet Rain follows the plight of women and the access to safe abortions in Ethiopia. Ethiopia has one of the most progressive abortion laws in all of Africa but despite this, women still face substantial obstacles in receiving safe abortions. Abortion is never ideal. But neither is rape, death, disease, poverty or back-street abortions. Not Yet Rain aims to inform and educate women and the community on what practices are safe and which can cause irreparable damage in many cases.




One of my favorite aspects about all three of these films is their commitment to bringing women's rights to the forefront of the discussion in development. It is easy to feel cynical that there is just too much to do and so little progress is ever made. However, these films not only give a voice to women but a sample of the faces of the hundreds of physicians, community health workers and volunteers who are working to give women the opportunity to make their own choices in their lives.

The World is Your Stage

Eight years after its first attempt to host a global summit on racism, the U.N. is not finding much luck the second time around (maybe third time will be the charm?). Everyone's favorite, furry leader, Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, decided to use his thirty minute speech to call Israel a racist nation, which was followed by a mass walk-out of about by the 30 diplomats, including 23 E.U. member nations who are in attendance (Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Poland have boycotted the conference altogether along with the U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand who describe it as a forum that is tainted with bad blood).

Certainly, Israel has not played fair in its occupation of some of the Palestinian territories, complete with some pretty atrocious behavior in its recent war in Gaza but then again, many Arab nations haven't been too active when it comes to atrocities committed by fellow leaders. Since the International Criminal Court issued its arrest warrent for Sudanese president Oman Al Bashir for war crimes and crimes against humanity, Israel's neighbors have acted as if there wasn't any sort of genocide happening in the region. In March, at the Arab Summit in Qatar, which followed the issuing of the ICC's warrant, not one of the attendees condemned Bashir and the deaths of over 300,000 in Darfur, rather supported him.

Two wrongs never make a right. Israel must answer for the illegal deaths of hundreds of innocent Palestinians but until Iran takes the lead to help bring Bashir to justice, it is no less guilty for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Darfuris than the rest of the world, which is idelly standing by.

**Photo by Erin Cunningham**

A: One boulder at a time

Today, Afghan President Hamid Karzai reversed recent measures that would have effectively allowed for legalized marital rapes in Shiite marriages. A measure that should never have been included in the recent law but an important step worth noting. Earlier in the week, women in Afghanistan risked their lives to protest the law and Karzai also received substantial backlash from much of the global community for allowing such archaic and disgraceful practices to continue against Afghanistan's minority women.

Q: What does it take to move mountains?

I was in the sixth grade, already reading the New York Times, when I first read about the Taliban in Afghanistan. It was a Sunday Times Magazine cover story and there was a picture of a woman, completely covered from head to toe who told the reporter that she had her M.D. but because of the Taliban she was no longer allowed to even leave her home without a male escort. I remember thinking, how strange it was that people wouldn't want doctors to work and help the sick and injured.

Fast forward 13 years and it seems that Afghan women are still confronted with the same problem. Despite Afghanistan's (supposed) liberation from the Taliban in 2001 a new law has been passed by both chambers of Parliament that would effectively make it illegal for Shiite a woman to resist her husband's sexual advances. She will need his permission to work outside of their home or even go to school, and finally, it would also be illegal for a women to refuse to dress the way her husband wants her to dress.

Although this problem can easily be perceived as black and white (and, emotionally, I really want it to be considered that way) the way in which the global community can put an end to these outrageous laws is not, unfortunately, black and white.

**Photo courtesy of UNHCR**

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