Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus – Lake Chad Region

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High-Level Conference in Berlin commits to comprehensive crisis response in the Lake Chad Region as donors announce US$2.17 billion in support; US$467 million in concessional loans
Report from UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Published on 04 Sep 2018
:: Conference highlights the regional dimension of the Lake Chad crisis, the crucial role of local actors, cross-border cooperation and ownership at all levels
:: Donors announce US$2.17 billion to support humanitarian, peacebuilding and development activities in Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria; multilateral financial institutions announce US$467 million in concessional loans
:: Stakeholders commit to address the immediate and longer-term needs and help build the resilience of millions of crisis-affected people in the Lake Chad region

Berlin, 4 September 2018 – The High-Level Conference on the Lake Chad Region concluded today with renewed commitments by participants to work together to address the multi-faceted crisis affecting the region. More than 70 countries, international organizations and civil society actors gathered in Berlin on 3-4 September to discuss solutions to bring peace and stability to the affected countries. The participants discussed humanitarian assistance, crisis prevention and stabilization, as well as development, to chart a way forward for a comprehensive and inclusive response. The conference provided an excellent opportunity for in-depth discussions on various aspects that had been raised during the 2017 Oslo Humanitarian Conference on Nigeria and the Lake Chad Region.

More than 17 million people across north-eastern Nigeria and parts of Cameroon, Chad and Niger are facing a complex crisis driven by extreme poverty, climate change and violent conflict. As a result, more than 2.4 million people are displaced and over 10 million people need assistance to meet their basic protection and humanitarian needs. Participants agreed that a coherent, multi-year approach is needed that integrates all available instruments to tackle the protection crisis and the root causes of the conflict. This is needed to pave the way for sustainable and resilient development of the region, and thus contribute to a better future for the affected people….

Statement on the Lake Chad Region – Berlin Humanitarian Conference
by Dr Rick Brennan, WHO Director of Emergency Operations
Berlin, Germany
3 September 2018

Distinguished delegates,
As others have observed today, the narrative and dialogue around the Lake Chad Basin crisis has matured significantly since we met in Oslo last year.

We need to make the humanitarian-development peace nexus concrete. There is a general recognition that robust and principled humanitarian action is necessary – but not sufficient – to meet the needs of the people in the region. There is also an acknowledgment that root causes must be met, resilience of communities and institutions built, and the humanitarian-development-peace nexus operationalized.

Our challenge remains to shift from agreeing on these concepts and principles, to ensuring their concrete implementation – and to identify the solutions that Mark Lowcock constantly urges us to develop.

There are unique opportunities for effective implementation of the New Way or Working within the Lake Chad Basin sub-region, especially within the health sector. In fact, there is probably no better opportunity in the world today than the Lake Chad Basin region to demonstrate that it is possible to effectively implement the New Way of Working. And it is the view of WHO and our health sector partners, that health presents unique opportunities in this regard.

Humanitarian health response has been effective to date and must be sustained. Humanitarian health action has already documented some remarkable achievements over the past two years in Northeast Nigeria. Through progressively expanding access to essential health services – and working in collaboration with other life-saving sectors – we have documented a sharp drop in mortality in Northeast Nigeria. Mortality rates, which were dramatically elevated above emergency thresholds early in the response, are now within normal limits, at least among those populations to whom we have access. Last year, a collaborative malaria control effort with the Ministry of Health, UNICEF and other partners averted at least 6500 childhood deaths due to malaria. We have also jointly responded effectively to major outbreaks of measles, cholera, meningitis and polio. You may recall that polio established its foothold back in Africa due to the crisis in Northeast Nigeria.

Resilience in the health sector must be built at individual and systems levels. While we all aim to maintain a strong humanitarian response for the short-to medium- term, we see several important opportunities to build the resilience of both individuals and the health system. Firstly, there are few factors that make individuals more resilient physically and mentally than good health and strong nutritional status. Continued strengthening of the coverage and quality of essential health services will help to ensure that individuals are both resistant to disease and recover more rapidly when they do become ill.

Similarly, we need to make the health system itself resilient. Perhaps the best example of this is through building its capacities to prevent, detect and respond to outbreaks of infectious diseases. The Lake Chad region is remarkably prone to outbreaks of disease that have crossed borders, such as meningitis, cholera and hepatitis E. Building capacities for disease surveillance, laboratory diagnosis, and rapid response is vital to the resilience of any health system – and this is nowhere more evident than in the Lake Chad region.

Good governance is essential for sustainable health system development. We also need to be concrete about how we lay the foundations of longer-term health system recovery and development. This can be a complex process, as we have learned in other contexts. But I would like to highlight a sine qua non for sustainable development within the health sector – and that is good governance and leadership. All of the support from international partners will come to naught in the longer term unless authorities at all levels take strong ownership of the health system, ensure transparent management processes and provide an inclusive voice for communities. Involvement of civil society and the private sector has been demonstrated to contribute to health system recovery in several examples and we need to accelerate this process in the context of Lake Chad.

The health sector can contribute to peacebuilding. Finally, the health sector can play its own modest role in advancing peace and reconciliation. Public health campaigns can be opportunities for humanitarian pauses and can be a leading wedge for opening up humanitarian access. Polio vaccinations have helped to open access for other health services in Northeast Nigeria, for example. Re-establishing health services can be a confidence and trust-building process. This is especially true when they are extended to populations who have historically been neglected by central authorities and when they are designed to address longer-term inequities.

In summary, ladies and gentlemen, we must collectively move from agreeing on what needs to be done, to taking concrete steps to implement the humanitarian-development-peace nexus across all sectors. Conceptual frameworks and good intentions and are not enough – we must implement, and we must do so with the full engagement of communities and national partners.

Human Rights – India

UN Human Rights Chief applauds Indian Supreme Court decision to decriminalize same-sex relationships
GENEVA (7 September 2018) – The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet on Friday applauded the decision by the Indian Supreme Court to decriminalize consensual same sex relations.

“This is a great day for India and for all those who believe in the universality of human rights,” Bachelet said. “With this landmark decision, the Indian Supreme Court has taken a big step forward for freedom and equality. I hope that other courts elsewhere in the world will look to India’s example and be encouraged to move in the same direction.”

Laws that criminalize consensual same-sex relations violate fundamental rights including the rights to privacy and freedom from discrimination.

“Throughout the world such laws have led to a litany of abuses against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people including arbitrary arrests, violence, bullying in schools, denial of access to health and harassment at work,” the High Commissioner said. “Such discriminatory laws have no place in the 21st century, and I’m delighted the Indian Supreme Court has recognised that. Yesterday’s decision, which was unanimous and may not be appealed, effectively settles the matter in India once and for all.”

The most immediate effect of the Supreme Court’s ruling is that section 377 of the Indian Penal Code – a colonial era law – will no longer criminalize consensual same sex relations in private. But its real impact is likely to be much wider: by decriminalizing same sex relationships, the court has sent a powerful signal that LGBT people are equal and valued members of the Indian community.

“While the decision on section 377 will not achieve equality overnight,” Bachelet said, “it does pave the way for greater inclusion and acceptance of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in India, and over time may help dispel the stigma associated with being LGBT.” She urged the authorities to move swiftly to build on the court’s decision by introducing new measures to protect the rights of LGBT people – including effective anti-discrimination measures.

The High Commissioner also paid tribute to the LGBT community in India, “particularly to the many LGBT activists and their allies in the human rights movement who worked so hard and waited so long for this moment.”…

Featured Journal Content

PNAS – Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/
[Accessed 8 Sep 2018]

Infants distinguish between leaders and bullies
Francesco Margoni, Renée Baillargeon, and Luca Surian
PNAS published ahead of print September 4, 2018 https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1801677115
Significance
Prior research indicates that infants can represent power asymmetries and expect them to both endure over time and extend across situations. Building on these efforts, we examined whether 21-month-old infants could distinguish between two different bases of social power. Infants first saw three protagonists interact with a powerful character who was either a leader (with respect-based power) or a bully (with fear-based power). Next, the character gave an order to the protagonists. Infants expected the protagonists to continue to obey the leader’s order after she left the scene, but they expected the protagonists to obey the bully’s order only when she remained present. Thus, by 21 months of age, infants can already distinguish between respect-based and fear-based power relations.
Abstract
We examined whether 21-month-old infants could distinguish between two broad types of social power: respect-based power exerted by a leader (who might be an authority figure with legitimate power, a prestigious individual with merited power, or some combination thereof) and fear-based power exerted by a bully. Infants first saw three protagonists interact with a character who was either a leader (leader condition) or a bully (bully condition). Next, the character gave an order to the protagonists, who initially obeyed; the character then left the scene, and the protagonists either continued to obey (obey event) or no longer did so (disobey event). Infants in the leader condition looked significantly longer at the disobey than at the obey event, suggesting that they expected the protagonists to continue to obey the leader in her absence. In contrast, infants in the bully condition looked equally at the two events, suggesting that they viewed both outcomes as plausible: The protagonists might continue to obey the absent bully to prevent further harm, or they might disobey her because her power over them weakened in her absence. Additional results supported these interpretations: Infants expected obedience when the bully remained in the scene and could harm the protagonists if defied, but they expected disobedience when the order was given by a character with little or no power over the protagonists. Together, these results indicate that by 21 months of age, infants already hold different expectations for subordinates’ responses to individuals with respect-based as opposed to fear-based power.

Featured Journal Content

The Lancet
Sep 01, 2018 Volume 392 Number 10149 p711-794
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/issue/current
Comment
Childhood mortality during conflicts in Africa
Emelda A Okiro, Philip Ayieko
Published: August 30, 2018DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(18)31373-4
The International humanitarian law differentiates two types of armed conflicts: international (between states) and non-international (domestic). 1 Since 1989, 75% of non-state armed conflicts have been in Africa. 2 Children and women bear most of the burden of these events. Childhood deaths due to conflicts present a real threat to the achievement of the global target of ending preventable deaths of children by 2030. 3 Despite the link between armed conflicts and direct deaths (combat-related) and indirect deaths (excess mortality because of worsening health disparities and disruption of basic health services), most assessments of childhood deaths done to date have not explicitly incorporated the effect of conflicts on child survival. 4 The need to address this gap takes on a greater urgency in the African region, where there has been a flare-up in both intensity and magnitude of armed conflicts. 5,, 6

Articles
Armed conflict and child mortality in Africa: a geospatial analysis
Zachary Wagner, Sam Heft-Neal, Zulfiqar A Bhutta, Robert E Black, Marshall Burke, Eran Bendavid
Summary
Background
A substantial portion of child deaths in Africa take place in countries with recent history of armed conflict and political instability. However, the extent to which armed conflict is an important cause of child mortality, especially in Africa, remains unknown.
Methods
We matched child survival with proximity to armed conflict using information in the Uppsala Conflict Data Program Georeferenced Events Dataset on the location and intensity of armed conflict from 1995 to 2015 together with the location, timing, and survival of infants younger than 1 year (primary outcome) in 35 African countries. We measured the increase in mortality risk for infants exposed to armed conflicts within 50 km in the year of birth and, to study conflicts’ extended health risks, up to 250 km away and 10 years before birth. We also examined the effects of conflicts of varying intensity and chronicity (conflicts lasting several years), and effect heterogeneity by residence and sex of the child. We then estimated the number and portion of deaths of infants younger than 1 year related to conflict.
Findings
We identified 15,441 armed conflict events that led to 968,444 combat-related deaths and matched these data with 1·99 million births and 133,361 infant deaths (infant mortality of 67 deaths per 1000 births) between 1995 and 2015. A child born within 50 km of an armed conflict had a risk of dying before reaching age 1 year of 5·2 per 1000 births higher than being born in the same region during periods without conflict (95% CI 3·7–6·7; a 7·7% increase above baseline). This increased risk of dying ranged from a 3·0% increase for armed conflicts with one to four deaths to a 26·7% increase for armed conflicts with more than 1000 deaths. We find evidence of increased mortality risk from an armed conflict up to 100 km away, and for 8 years after conflicts, with cumulative increase in infant mortality two to four times higher than the contemporaneous increase. In the entire continent, the number of infant deaths related to conflict from 1995 to 2015 was between 3·2 and 3·6 times the number of direct deaths from armed conflicts.
Interpretation
Armed conflict substantially and persistently increases infant mortality in Africa, with effect sizes on a scale with malnutrition and several times greater than existing estimates of the mortality burden of conflict. The toll of conflict on children, who are presumably not combatants, underscores the indirect toll of conflict on civilian populations, and the importance of developing interventions to address child health in areas of conflict.
Funding
The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, and the Centre for Global Child Health at the Hospital for Sick Children.

Emergencies

POLIO
Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)
Polio this week as of 4 September 2018 [GPEI]
The Johns Hopkins University is leading a project to document lessons learned from GPEI, and translating those lessons to improve delivery of other lifesaving health programmes and strengthening health systems globally. Read more and learn how you can contribute: GPEI Lessons Learned Project.

Summary of new viruses this week:
Afghanistan – One new case of wild poliovirus (WPV1).
Pakistan – One new case of wild poliovirus (WPV1).
Afghanistan and Pakistan continue to detect WPV1 through environmental sampling, indicating sustained transmission
Papua New Guinea – three new cases of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 1 (cVDPV1).
Somalia – two new cases of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2).

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GPEI Lessons Learned Project
The Johns Hopkins University is leading a project to document lessons learned from GPEI, and translating those lessons to improve delivery of other lifesaving health programmes and strengthening health systems globally.

As an initial step in the project, a global survey is underway to map tacit knowledge of GPEI actors about implementation challenges (and the contexts in which those arose).

The specific objectives of the survey are:
:: Map tacit knowledge (ideas, approaches and experiences that were not documented, but relevant for both intended and unintended results) about GPEI under various context typologies
:: Identify key facilitators for GPEI programme implementation
:: Identify key implementation challenges, the level where they originated from (global, national, subnational), and how they were resolved.

The target audience for the global survey includes:
:: Individuals who have been directly involved in implementing activities under the GPEI between 1988 to date. Implementing activities refer to all cycles of implementation, including GPEI-related funding, policy, programming, and research cycles. The population includes individuals who have spent 12 or more continuous months working on activities under the GPEI between 1988 to date.

If you meet the specifications of the target audience, your participation is requested in this online survey, which takes approximately 15-30 minutes.

How to participate in the survey
Access to the survey can be granted by reaching out to the project team at poliolessonslearned@gmail.com with your name and organization.

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Editor’s Note:
WHO has posted a refreshed emergencies page which presents an updated listing of Grade 3,2,1 emergencies as below.

WHO Grade 3 Emergencies  [to 15 Sep 2018]
Bangladesh – Rohingya crisis
:: Using local materials to build health facilities  12 September 2018
:: Weekly Situation Report 42 – 6 September 2018pdf, 220kb
 KEY HIGHLIGHTS

• The next round of oral cholera campaign (OCV) will begin on 6 October 2018, targeting 327 364 people.
• Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI) and suspected malaria cases are showing an increasing trend.
• A total of nine Mobile Medical Teams were deployed in week 35. Primary health care and dental care services were provided to 3 375 people across 13 camps.

SITUATION OVERVIEW

• According to the Needs and Population Monitoring (NPM) exercise, there are an estimated 919 000 Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazar as of 22 July 2018. Of these, 706 364 are new arrivals since 25 August 2017.
• More heavy rain from the current monsoon season and the second season of cyclones and monsoons toward the end of the year will increase the risk of water-borne diseases such as cholera and hepatitis A and vector-borne diseases such as malaria, dengue and chikungunya.

Democratic Republic of the Congo
:: 06: Situation report on the Ebola outbreak in North Kivu 11 September 2018
:: Disease Outbreak News (DONs) – Ebola virus disease – Democratic Republic of the Congo
14 September 2018
[See Milestones above for more detail]

Yemen
:: WHO statement on the health situation in Yemen  7 September 2018
Dr Ahmed Al Mandhari, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean
[See Milestones above for more detail]

Iraq – No new announcements identified
Nigeria – No new announcements identified
Somalia – No new announcements identified
South Sudan – No new announcements identified
Syrian Arab Republic – No new announcements identified

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WHO Grade 2 Emergencies  [to 15 Sep 2018]
Cameroon  – See below
Central African Republic  – See below
Hurricane Irma and Maria in the Caribbean – No new announcements identified
occupied Palestinian territory – No new announcements identified
Libya – No new announcements identified
Myanmar – No new announcements identified
South Africa Listeriosis (2017) – See below
Sudan – No new announcements identified
Ukraine – No new announcements identified
Sao Tome and Principe Necrotizing Cellulitis (2017) – No new announcements identified

Outbreaks and Emergencies Bulletin, Week 36: 1 – 7 September 2018
The WHO Health Emergencies Programme is currently monitoring 55 events in the region. This week’s edition covers key ongoing events, including:
:: Declaration of the end of the listeriosis outbreak in South Africa
:: Ebola virus disease in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
:: Cholera in Niger
:: Cholera in Cameroon
:: Hepatitis E in Namibia
:: Humanitarian crisis in Central African Republic.

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WHO Grade 1 Emergencies  [to 15 Sep 2018]
Afghanistan
Angola (in Portuguese)
Chad
Ethiopia
Kenya
Lao People’s Democratic Republic
Mali
Papua New Guinea
Peru
Tanzania
Tropical Cyclone Gira
Zambia
 
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UN OCHA – L3 Emergencies
The UN and its humanitarian partners are currently responding to three ‘L3’ emergencies. This is the global humanitarian system’s classification for the response to the most severe, large-scale humanitarian crises. 
Yemen 
:: Yemen Humanitarian Update Covering 27 August – 6 September 2018 | Issue 26
Published on 06 Sep 2018
KEY ISSUES:
:: As the depreciation of the Yemeni Rial continues, a further 3.5 million people may become food insecure and an additional 2 million may face a heightened risk of famine.
:: The conflict in Yemen continues to exact a heavy toll on civilians. In August, 241 civilian impact incidents were reported.
:: Humanitarian partners continue to work to prevent a third outbreak of cholera; some 133,000 suspected cholera cases have been confirmed since January…

Syrian Arab Republic   – No new announcements identified.

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UN OCHA – Corporate Emergencies
When the USG/ERC declares a Corporate Emergency Response, all OCHA offices, branches and sections provide their full support to response activities both at HQ and in the field.
Ethiopia  – No new announcements identified.
Somalia   – No new announcements identified.

The Sentinel

Human Rights Action :: Humanitarian Response :: Health :: Education :: Heritage Stewardship ::
Sustainable Development
__________________________________________________
Week ending 1 September 2018

This weekly digest is intended to aggregate and distill key content from a broad spectrum of practice domains and organization types including key agencies/IGOs, NGOs, governments, academic and research institutions, consortia and collaborations, foundations, and commercial organizations. We also monitor a spectrum of peer-reviewed journals and general media channels. The Sentinel’s geographic scope is global/regional but selected country-level content is included. We recognize that this spectrum/scope yields an indicative and not an exhaustive product. Comments and suggestions should be directed to:

David R. Curry
Editor
GE2P2 Global Foundation – Governance, Evidence, Ethics, Policy, Practice
david.r.curry@ge2p2center.net

PDF – The Sentinel_ period ending 1 Sep 2018

Contents
:: Week in Review  [See selected posts just below]
:: Key Agency/IGO/Governments Watch – Selected Updates from 30+ entities   [see PDF]
:: INGO/Consortia/Joint Initiatives Watch – Media Releases, Major Initiatives, Research:: Foundation/Major Donor Watch -Selected Updates  [see PDF]
:: Journal Watch – Key articles and abstracts from 100+ peer-reviewed journals  [see PDF]

Myanmar – “Refugee Problem”

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Myanmar’s Refugee Problem among World’s Worst Humanitarian, Human Rights Crises, Secretary-General Says in Briefing to Security Council
28 August 2018
SC/13469
Fact-Finding Mission’s Impartiality Questioned as Bangladesh Stresses Naypyidaw’s Duty to Build Rohingya’s Trust in Safe, Peaceful Returns
[Editor’s text bolding]
One year after the start of the Rohingya refugee crisis, the Security Council considered today the report issued by the independent fact-finding mission dispatched to that country, which alleges that national security forces committed gross human rights violations and abuses that “undoubtedly amount to the gravest crimes under international law”.

Briefing the 15-member Council, Secretary-General António Guterres said the massive refugee emergency that began in Myanmar’s Rakhine State has become “one of the world’s worst humanitarian and human rights crises”. While condemning attacks against the security forces by extremists in October 2016 and August 2017, he nevertheless emphasized that nothing can ever justify the disproportionate use of force against civilians or the gross human rights violations committed by the Myanmar security forces and their allies.

Regrettably, the Secretary-General continued, Myanmar has refused to cooperate with United Nations human rights entities and mechanisms, despite repeated calls to do so, including by members of the Council. Emphasizing that patterns of violations against ethnic and religious minorities beyond Rakhine must also end in order for genuine democracy to take root, he said unity among Council members was essential.

Also addressing the Council was Tegegnework Gettu, Associate Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), who said that creating sustainable conditions for the voluntary return of refugees from Bangladesh will require comprehensive and durable solutions. Outlining efforts by UNDP and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to create conditions suitable for voluntary returns, he said effective access and streamlined procedures are essential to accessing entire tracts of villages and undertaking area-based programmes that will help to build social cohesion…

…Myanmar’s representative said that his country’s Government does not accept the mandate of the fact-finding mission due to concerns about its impartiality. “I have serious doubt on the intention of the timing of the release of the report,” he added, pointing out that it was released on the eve of today’s Security Council meeting on his country. Addressing deep-rooted and complex issues in Rakhine State is a fundamental and crucial part of the Government’s efforts to build peace and national reconciliation, he stressed.

Representatives of China and the Russian Federation argued that the crisis requires a long-term, patient approach rather than pressure, and must be resolved through bilateral diplomatic efforts.

The representative of Bangladesh called upon the Council to further calibrate its response in light of prevailing circumstances on the ground and emerging evidence of atrocities against the Rohingya. Emphasizing that the return of refugees cannot begin unless the Rohingya themselves regain the trust and confidence to opt voluntarily for repatriation, he declared: “It would be entirely up to the Myanmar authorities to build trust among the Rohingya about their sustainable return and peaceful coexistence with other communities in Rakhine State.”…

Development

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UK launches ambition to generate billions more investment in Africa to trigger transformational growth
The UK aims to generate up to £8 billion of vital public and private investment in Africa to create jobs and boost growth over the next four years
Published 28 August 2018
:: CDC Group, the UK’s Development Finance Institution, will aim to invest up to £3.5 billion in Africa, supporting hundreds of thousands of jobs.
:: The UK will aim to mobilise a further £4 billion of private investment for African countries, particularly from the City of London.

[Editor’s text bolding]
The UK is announcing a range of measures to boost much-needed investment in businesses and infrastructure across Africa, the Prime Minister announced in Cape Town today (Tuesday 28th August). This includes for the first time ever setting a clear ambition of mobilising an additional £4 billion of private sector investment into the continent by working more closely with the City of London.

This comes as the Prime Minister has today also set a new ambition for the UK to be the largest G7 foreign direct investor in Africa by 2020.

Africa’s population is set to double by 2050 and as many as 18 million extra jobs a year will be needed. There is a chronic need for private and public investment to create better opportunities in Africa to prevent the next generation falling further into poverty, potentially fuelling instability and mass migration with direct consequences for Britain.

But this growth also means that the scale of the opportunity across Africa is huge: according to the IMF, Africa’s GDP is set to reach $3.2 trillion in the next five years.

Home to the City of London, the world’s leading financial centre, the UK is well-positioned to become Africa’s future investment partner of choice. Initiatives announced today in support of this include:
:: CDC, the UK’s Development Finance Institution, will significantly increase its investment into Africa – aiming to invest up to £3.5 billion in businesses on the continent over four years. This will support hundreds of thousands of jobs, build stability and trigger growth in some of the poorest and most fragile countries.
:: A new investment of up to £300 million of UK aid invested through the Private Infrastructure Development Group (PIDG) will build essential infrastructure such as power, roads and water, that will lay the foundations for new trading and business opportunities across Africa in places businesses previously would not have been able to operate…

In addition to announcing a substantial scale up of investment through CDC and PIDG, the UK is setting a clear ambition to mobilise £4 billion of private investment, particularly from the City of London. In total, UK initiatives will generate up to £8 billion (around $10 billion) of investment for African countries between 2018 and 2021.

The UK’s commitment to building bigger, broader economic partnerships with African nations will prove a huge benefit to UK business and investors, while also accelerating the transformational growth needed to lift countries out of poverty for good and to forge mutually beneficial partnerships between the UK and African countries.

The City of London manages over £8 trillion of assets but at the moment only around 1% of those assets are invested in Africa.

This partnership will mobilise further capital from pension funds, insurance companies and other investors, enabling the City to take on an even greater role as Africa’s partner of choice for financial services as the UK leaves the EU.

This will create the opportunity to boost investment returns for the UK’s pension pot, while triggering essential long-term investment for African businesses, transforming the world’s poorest nations into the UK’s trading partners of the future.

As part of this new and distinctive offer to work alongside, invest in and partner with African nations for our mutual benefit, we will be bringing in more ‘Best of British’ experts including extra investment specialists, to work with African governments and businesses to unlock the private sector finance so critical to sustained growth, job creation and tackling poverty.

Human Rights – Gender-based Violence

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Fact Sheet: Update on Addressing Gender-Based Violence in Development Projects
World Bank   Factsheet August 30, 2018
Understanding the context of Gender-Based Violence (GBV) in development
:: According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 35% of women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence.

:: The effects of violence experienced by women, such as intimate partner violence, are felt at the individual, family, and community levels. Consequences of violence include increased risk for suicide, alcohol abuse, as well as negative impacts on human development outcomes.

:: Gender-based violence has dire economic consequences, costing an estimated 1.2%-3.7% of GDP in some countries due to lost productivity, equivalent to the average spending of low and middle-income countries on primary education.

:: Decreasing GBV requires a community-based, multi-pronged approach, and sustained engagement with multiple stakeholders. The most effective initiatives address underlying risk factors for violence, including social norms regarding gender roles and the acceptability of violence.

:: Low and middle-income countries have fewer quality service available for women experiencing violence.  This impairs their path to recovery.

Learning from the past and partners – evolution of the World Bank’s work on addressing GBV  

:: The World Bank has engaged with countries and partners since 2003 to support projects and knowledge products aimed at preventing and addressing GBV. However, over the last few years, the Bank has ramped up its efforts to more effectively address GBV risks in its operations, including learning from other institutions.

:: The World Bank supports over $250 million in development projects aimed at addressing GBV in World Bank Group (WBG)-financed operations, both through standalone projects and through the integration of GBV components in sector-specific projects in areas such as transport, education, social protection, and forced displacement.

:: The World Bank also conducts analytical work on violence against women and girls, a topic on which there is limited empirical data. For example, Violence against Women and Girls: Lessons from South Asia is the first report of its kind to gather all available data and information on GBV in the region. In partnership with research institutions and other development organizations, the World Bank has also compiled a comprehensive review of the global evidence for effective interventions to prevent or reduce violence against women and girls. These lessons are now informing our work in several sectors, and are captured in sector-specific resources in the VAWG Resource Guide: www.vawgresourceguide.org.

:: The World Bank’s Global Platform on Addressing GBV in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Settings facilitated South-South knowledge sharing through workshops and yearly learning tours, building evidence on what works to prevent GBV, and providing quality services to women, men, and child survivors.  The Platform included a $13 million cross-regional and cross-practice initiative, establishing pilot projects in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Nepal, Papua New Guinea, and Georgia, focused on GBV prevention and mitigation, as well as knowledge and learning activities.

:: In October 2016, the World Bank launched the Global Gender-Based Violence Task Force to strengthen the institution’s efforts to prevent and respond to risks of GBV, and particularly sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) that may arise in World Bank-supported  projects. It builds on existing work by the World Bank and other actors to tackle violence against women and girls through strengthened approaches to identifying and assessing key risks, and developing key mitigations measures to prevent and respond to sexual exploitation and abuse and other forms of GBV.

:: In line with its commitments under IDA 18, the World Bank developed an Action Plan for Implementation of the Task Force’s recommendations, consolidating key actions across institutional priorities linked to enhancing social risk management, strengthening operational systems to enhance accountability, and building staff and client capacity to address risks of GBV through training and guidance materials.

:: In line with recommendations by the Task Force to disseminate lessons learned from past projects, and to sensitize staff on the importance of addressing risks of GBV/SEA, the World Bank has held a series of learning events for staff to share the recommendations of the Task Force and associated Action Plan, and to raise wider awareness of the need to address GBV risks. Additional guidance for staff is being developed in the context of the Bank’s new Environmental and Social Framework.

:: The World Bank regularly convenes a wide range of development stakeholders to address violence against women and girls. For example, WBG President Jim Yong Kim has committed to an annual Development Marketplace competition, together with the Sexual Violence Research Initiative, to encourage researchers from around the world to build the evidence base of what works to prevent GBV.

Addressing GBV, including SEA, in World Bank Group-financed Operations

:: Learning from and working with development partners and client countries, the World Bank has developed a GBV risk assessment tool to assess contextual and project-related risks. The tool is to be used by any project containing civil works, and was tested by the Transport sector, as well as part of GBV risk portfolio reviews undertaken in DRC, Nigeria, Ghana, and Cameroon.

:: The World Bank is piloting innovative uses of social media to change behaviors. For example, in the South Asia region, the pilot program WEvolve used social media to empower young women and men to challenge and break through prevailing norms that underpin gender violence.

:: Learning from the Uganda Transport Sector Development Project and following the Global GBV Task Force’s recommendations, the World Bank started incorporating GBV issues in infrastructure projects in recent years:

In the East Asia and Pacific region, GBV prevention and response interventions – including a code of conduct on sexual exploitation and abuse – are embedded within the Vanuatu Aviation Investment Project.

:: The Liberia Southeastern Corridor Road Asset Management Project, where SEA awareness will be raised, among other strategies, as part of a pilot project to employ women in the use of heavy machinery.

:: The Bolivia Santa Cruz Road Corridor Project uses a three-pronged approach to address potential GBV, including a Code of Conduct for their workers; a Grievance Redress Mechanism (GRM) that includes a specific mandate to address any kinds gender-based violence; and concrete measures to empower women and to bolster their economic resilience by helping them learn new skills, improve the production and commercialization of traditional arts and crafts, and access more investment opportunities.

:: The Mozambique Integrated Feeder Road Development Project identified SEA as a substantial risk during project preparation and takes a preemptive approach: a Code of Conduct; support to – and guidance for – the survivors in case any instances of SEA were to occur within the context of the project – establishing a “survivor-centered approach” that creates multiple entry points for anyone experiencing SEA to seek the help they need; and these measures are taken in close coordination with local community organizations, and an international NGO Jhpiego, which has extensive experience working in Mozambique.

Stand-alone GBV Operations:

:: In June 2017, the Board approved the $40 million Uganda Strengthening Social Risk Management and Gender-Based Violence Prevention and Response Project. The project focuses on community-based interventions for the prevention of GBV, drawing from several rigorously evaluated approaches, and on strengthening critical sectors to provide quality response services to survivors of GBV. The project also includes an Impact Evaluation focusing on GBV prevention interventions.

:: In the Great Lakes Emergency Sexual and Gender Based Violence & Women’s Health Project, the World Bank approved $107 million in financial grants to Burundi, the DRC, and Rwanda to provide integrated health and counseling services, legal aid, and economic opportunities to survivors of – or those affected by – sexual and gender-based violence. In DRC alone, 40,000 people, including 29,000 women, have received these services and support.

:: In August 2018, the World Bank committed $100 million to help prevent GBV in the DRC. The Gender-Based Violence Prevention and Response Project will reach 795,000 direct beneficiaries over the course of four years. The project will provide help to survivors of GBV, and aim to shift social norms by promoting gender equality and behavioral change through strong partnerships with civil society organizations.

Water
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Water Management in Fragile Systems: Building Resilience to Shocks and Protracted Crises in the Middle East and North Africa
FAO-World Bank August 28, 2018 :: 74 pages
PDF: English PDF (3.219MB
Water scarcity is pervasive throughout the Middle East and North Africa and getting worse. Even before the recent political turmoil, several countries in the Middle East and North Africa were struggling to manage their water resources sustainably and to expand water supply and sanitation services efficiently. Now conflict has combined with weak institutional performance and contributed to an intensification of water challenges and a deterioration of water services. A new World Bank-FAO joint discussion paper finds that institutional failures to address water-related challenges can act as risk multipliers, compounding existing situations of fragility. But improving water management can contribute to building resilience in the face of protracted crises.

Key Findings
THE VICIOUS CYCLE OF WATER AND FRAGILITY
· The Middle East and North Africa water challenges are intensifying. Rising demands,
climate change, inter-sectoral competition and urbanization are exacerbating the region’s age-old water scarcity challenges. In some countries of the region, poorly adapted governance structures and distorted incentives mean that these challenges are largely left unaddressed and actions and policies are not sustained. Distortions in policies and institutions have created a system that does not recognize the value of water.

· The scale of the challenge is unprecedented. Countries in the Middle East and North Africa have been at the forefront in developing practices and institutions to manage scarce water resources in the context of a largely arid and highly variable climate. However, the scale of the current water crisis is unprecedented and requires coordinated responses across institutions in many locations.

· Failure to find solutions to water challenges aggravates fragility. Water crises strain the ability of individuals and societies to maintain livelihood security and political stability.

· Fragility makes it harder to address water issues. Fragile situations – characterized by weak and ineffective institutions, histories of conflict, unsustainable livelihood systems and decaying or damaged infrastructure – compound challenges to sustainable water management.

· The compounding nature of water and fragility gives rise to a vicious cycle. In this vicious cycle, fragility makes it more difficult for water management to be effective, in turn amplifying the negative political, social and environmental consequences of water-related challenges. At the same time, as water issues are left unaddressed, their impact increases, eroding government legitimacy and destabilizing fragile contexts.

· Don’t blame the drought. We don’t claim that there are direct causal linkages between water crises, social tensions and unrest, migration, or other manifestations of fragility. But what is clear is that institutions and policy choices can mediate water-related impacts on people and economies. In the meantime, water-related challenges can amplify fragility risks when policy design and implementation do not adequately promote sustainability, inclusion and resilience.

WHAT CAN BE DONE?
· Addressing water and fragility challenges requires a move from a focus primarily on immediate, reactive responses to a balanced long-term approach. This approach would build growth-oriented resilience to shocks and protracted crises focused on sustainable, efficient and equitable water resources management and service delivery.

· Use decentralized, participatory approaches. Because of the essentially local nature of water and agriculture problems, community consultation, participation and ownership are vital, as is working with whatever local government may exist on the ground.

· Invest in innovative policies and practices. Research, technology development and transfer can provide further improvements to water efficiency and crop productivity in the region.

· Working together within countries and across boundaries is essential. Given the scale and commonality of the challenges, the relatively small size of many countries in the region and the transboundary nature of important issues like climate change and shared water resources, collective action and partnerships are essential.

BUILDING RESILIENCE: WATER MANAGEMENT TO PROMOTE PEACE AND STABILITY
· Water management is conducive to stability and peacebuilding. Water and agriculture are key to recovery and stabilization and – ultimately – to peacebuilding. Water management offers the opportunity to empower communities and, more broadly, to develop inclusive institutions for responsible and transparent delivery of the resource.

· Addressing short-term livelihood and food security needs is essential in the short-term. Building resilience in water and agricultural systems in fragile and conflict-affected situations requires both the short-term and the long-term to be considered in planning from the very beginning, thus bridging the divide between humanitarian and development efforts.

· Sustainable water management is necessary for the long-term. During and immediately after conflict, interventions need to target water delivery services and ways to improve food security. One possible way to improve food security is by supporting smallholder crop and livestock production. Working with the private sector to restore basic access to water and sanitation to satisfy basic human needs and agricultural demands is a necessity.

Education – Refugee Children

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Turn the Tide: Refugee Education in Crisis
UNHCR
2018 :: 30 pages
PDF: http://www.unhcr.org/5b852f8e4.pdf
About this report
This report tells the stories of some of the world’s 7.4 million refugee children of school age under UNHCR’s mandate. In addition, it looks at the educational aspirations of refugee youth eager to continue learning after secondary education, and highlights the need for strong partnerships in order to break down the barriers to education for millions of refugee children.
Education data on refugee enrolments and population numbers is drawn from UNHCR’s population database, reporting tools and education surveys and refers to 2017. The report also references global enrolment data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics referring to 2016.

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Press Release
Millions of refugee children going without schooling, UNHCR report shows
29 August 2018
Four million refugee children do not attend school, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, says in a report released today. This is an increase of half a million of out-of-school refugee children in just one year.

The report, Turn the Tide: Refugee Education in Crisis, shows that, despite the efforts of governments, UNHCR and its partners, enrolment of refugee children in school is failing to keep pace with the growing refugee population. By the end of 2017, there were more than 25.4 million refugees around the world, 19.9 million of them under UNHCR’s mandate. More than half – 52 per cent – were children. Among them, 7.4 million were of school age.

“Education is a way to help children heal, but it is also key to rebuilding their countries,” said Filippo Grandi, UN High Commissioner for Refugees. “Without education, the future of these children and their communities will be irrevocably damaged.”

Only 61 per cent of refugee children attend primary school, compared to 92 per cent of children globally.

As refugee children get older, this gap grows. Nearly two thirds of refugee children who go to primary school do not make it to secondary school. In total, 23 per cent of refugee children attend secondary school, compared to 84 per cent of children globally.

At tertiary level, the gap becomes a chasm. Globally, enrolment in higher education stands at 37 per cent, while only one per cent of refugees have the same opportunity – a figure that has not changed in three years…

Education – Crisis Response

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UNICEF steps-up support for children ahead of new school year in Ebola affected areas of Eastern DRC
INSHASA/DAKAR/NEW YORK/GENEVA, 28 August 2018 – As more than 82,500 children prepare for the new school year in Ebola-affected areas of the Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), UNICEF is scaling up education, health and water, sanitation and hygiene programmes to assist the schools to provide a protective learning environment for children and their teachers.

The Government of the DRC recently made the decision to proceed as planned with the start of the school year in the affected provinces of North-Kivu and Ituri, where some 250 schools are listed as being in Ebola-affected health zones.

“Education is a right for every child and essential for children to develop to their full potential. Especially in times of crisis such as an Ebola outbreak, schools are vital for children to find stability, learn prevention measures and receive psychosocial support,” said Dr Gianfranco Rotigliano, UNICEF Representative in the DRC following his visit to Mangina, the epicentre of the Ebola-epidemic. “Every effort must go into ensuring a smooth and safe start to the new school year,” he added.

School principals and teachers will receive training on Ebola prevention and protection, and how to educate children on good hygiene practices to avoid the spread of the virus. To ensure schools in the affected health zones are well prepared for early detection and response, UNICEF is distributing health and WASH supplies including laser thermometers, hand washing units and megaphones and prevention posters to each of the 250 schools.

UNICEF and partners are working to:
:: train school principals and more than 1750 teachers in the affected health zones about Ebola and protection measures against the virus;
:: organise prevention communication activities for parents committees and local authorities on prevention measures in every concerned school;
:: prepare teachers to sensitize all children at the beginning of the school year on good hygiene practices to contain the spread of the virus;
:: distribute 500 laser thermometers – 2 in each school – to monitor the health situation of children;
:: install 1500 hand washing units – 6 in each school – to promote handwashing and hygiene;
:: distribute megaphones and prevention posters in every school

Ebola – Democratic Republic of the Congo

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WHO – Ebola virus disease – Democratic Republic of the Congo
Disease outbreak news
31 August 2018
The outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is at a key juncture. Recent trends (Figure 1) suggest that control measures are working. Over the past week, contact follow-up rates have substantially improved, most patients recently admitted to Ebola treatment centres (ETC) received therapeutics within hours of being confirmed, and ring vaccination activities have scaled to reach contacts (and their contacts) of most confirmed cases reported in the last three weeks. However, the outbreak trend must be interpreted with caution…

In addition to the ongoing response activities within outbreak affected areas, the MoH, WHO and partners will be implementing a 30-day strategic plan to ensure operational readiness measures against EVD are strengthened in all provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The first phase of implementation will prioritise six provinces at highest risk of case importations: South Kivu, Maniema, Ituri, Tanganika, Haut Uele and Bas Uele. The main objective is to ensure that these provinces implement essential operational readiness measures, including enhancing surveillance, IPC and social mobilization to mitigate, rapidly detect, investigate and effectively respond to a possible outbreak of EVD…

Emergencies
 
POLIO
Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)
Polio this week as of 28 August 2018 [GPEI]
Summary of new viruses this week:
Afghanistan – one new wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) case.
Democratic Republic of the Congo ‒ Based on positive contacts, two negative AFP index cases classified as circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 (cVDPV2).
Nigeria – three  new cases of cVDPV2.
Papua New Guinea – two  new cases of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 1 (cVDPV1)

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Statement of the Eighteenth IHR Emergency Committee Regarding the International Spread of Poliovirus
15 August 2018
[Excerpts; Editor’s text bolding]
The eighteenth meeting of the Emergency Committee under the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR) regarding the international spread of poliovirus was convened by the Director General on 15 August 2018 at WHO headquarters with members, advisers and invited Member States attending via teleconference…

Vaccine derived poliovirus
The committee was very concerned by the increase in circulating vaccine derived polioviruses (cVDPV).  Since the last meeting, new emergences with circulation of VDPV have been detected in Papua New Guinea, DR Congo (Mongala) and Nigeria (Sokoto).  In Nigeria and DR Congo multiple lineages of cVDPV2 are circulating concurrently, and in Somalia, both cVDPV2 and cVDPV3 are circulating.

Control of the outbreaks in DR Congo remains difficult to achieve.  Gene sequencing and analysis has shown that there have been three different cVDPV2 sub-types circulating.  The analysis of the newly detected cVDPV2 in Mongala Province indicates the virus has emerged after OPV2 withdrawal in 2016.  Conflict and population movement within and outside DR Congo represent a risk of further spread.  The detection of cVDPV2 in Ituri Province far from previously detected cases and adjacent to the border with Uganda heightened these concerns and is an example that the virus can spread long distances.  The outbreaks of Ebola virus disease further complicates the response.

The new outbreak of cVDPV1 in PNG highlights that there are vulnerable areas of the world not usually the focus of eradication efforts.  The swift action of the Government of PNG in declaring a national public health emergency was welcomed, and highlights the utility of the Temporary Recommendations in such circumstances.

The outbreaks of cVDPV2 in Somalia and Kenya, and cVDPV3 in Somalia are of major concern, particularly the apparent international spread between Somalia and Kenya.

The outbreaks of cVDPV2 in Jigawa, and for the second time in Sokoto, Nigeria, again underlines the vulnerability of northern Nigeria to poliovirus transmission.  Routine immunization coverage remains very poor in many areas of the country, although the national emergency programme to strengthen routine immunisation is beginning to make an impact in some areas….

Conclusion
The Committee unanimously agreed that the risk of international spread of poliovirus remains a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), and recommended the extension of Temporary Recommendations for a further three months…

Additional considerations
The outbreak in Papua New Guinea again highlights the ongoing vulnerability of some parts of the world to polioviruses. The committee urged countries in close proximity to the current outbreaks, such as Ethiopia, South Sudan and Indonesia to strengthen polio surveillance and routine immunization.

The Committee noted that the extension of the PHEIC for over four years in the context of the end game of the global eradication effort, was an exceptional use of the IHR.  The committee noted that some stakeholders are questioning whether this continued declaration of a PHEIC may weaken its impact as a tool to address global health emergencies, and specifically whether it continues to have utility noting that the risk of international spread appears to have substantially diminished since 2014.  It noted that it was not originally envisaged that a PHEIC would continue for such a long interval, but the committee feels that the circumstances of an eradication program such as polio are unique.  The committee was deeply concerned that the abrupt removal of the PHEIC might send out the wrong message to the global community and might reverse the gains made in reducing the risk of international spread in some areas.  There is sound evidence that the Temporary Recommendations have been an important factor in reducing the risk of international spread since 2014 [1][2].  The committee requested the secretariat to review whether there were alternative approaches or tools to achieve the same outcomes as the Temporary Recommendations for the polio PHEIC and report back to the committee in three months.

Based on the current situation regarding WPV1 and cVDPV, and the reports provided by Afghanistan, DR Congo, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea and Somalia, the Director-General accepted the Committee’s assessment and on 27 August 2018 determined that the situation relating to poliovirus continues to constitute a PHEIC, with respect to WPV1 and cVDPV.  The Director-General endorsed the Committee’s recommendations for countries meeting the definition for ‘States infected with WPV1, cVDPV1 or cVDPV3 with potential risk for international spread’, ‘States infected with cVDPV2 with potential risk for international spread’ and for ‘States no longer infected by WPV1 or cVDPV, but which remain vulnerable to re-infection by WPV or cVDPV’ and extended the Temporary Recommendations under the IHR to reduce the risk of the international spread of poliovirus, effective 27 August 2018.

The Sentinel

Human Rights Action :: Humanitarian Response :: Health :: Education :: Heritage Stewardship ::
Sustainable Development
__________________________________________________
Week ending 25 August 2018

This weekly digest is intended to aggregate and distill key content from a broad spectrum of practice domains and organization types including key agencies/IGOs, NGOs, governments, academic and research institutions, consortia and collaborations, foundations, and commercial organizations. We also monitor a spectrum of peer-reviewed journals and general media channels. The Sentinel’s geographic scope is global/regional but selected country-level content is included. We recognize that this spectrum/scope yields an indicative and not an exhaustive product. Comments and suggestions should be directed to:

David R. Curry
Editor
GE2P2 Global Foundation – Governance, Evidence, Ethics, Policy, Practice
david.r.curry@ge2p2center.net

PDF – The Sentinel_ period ending 25 Aug 2018

Contents
:: Week in Review  [See selected posts just below]
:: Key Agency/IGO/Governments Watch – Selected Updates from 30+ entities
:: INGO/Consortia/Joint Initiatives Watch – Media Releases, Major Initiatives, Research:: Foundation/Major Donor Watch -Selected Updates
:: Journal Watch – Key articles and abstracts from 100+ peer-reviewed journals

Ebola

Spiralling violence puts millions at risk in Ebola-hit eastern DRC
24 Aug 2018
This is a summary of what was said by UNHCR spokesperson Andrej Mahecic – to whom quoted text may be attributed – at today’s press briefing at the Palais des Nations in Geneva.

UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, is alarmed by the latest escalation of violence in already volatile and Ebola-hit North Kivu province in east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The cumulative effect of conflict and the outbreak of the deadly disease is threatening millions of Congolese.

The fighting involving a number of armed groups operating in the area has intensified in all six territories in North Kivu, a province bordering Rwanda and Uganda. Thousands of civilians have fled their burned out villages, bringing reports of brutal attacks. The already dire humanitarian situation has been further aggravated by an outbreak of Ebola virus in parts of the province. The disease has killed more than 60 people and infected dozens more in recent weeks.

Forced displacement in this part of the country remains massive. It is estimated that more than a million people are displaced in North Kivu. This is the highest concentration of internally displaced people (IDPs) in the DRC. An estimated half a million people have been forced from their homes this year alone.

UNHCR is particularly worried about the deteriorating situation in the Ebola-hit northern territory of Beni. The area is home to some 1.3 million people. Spiralling conflict has left the population living there virtually in a state of siege since October 2017. Reports of increased human rights violations and restrictions of humanitarian access are frequent. Estimates are that more than 100 armed groups are active in the province, continually terrorizing the population. Despite a large-scale military offensive of the Congolese Army against one of the main rebel groups, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) since January, there has been no let-up in the violence.

Despite security challenges, a UNHCR team accessed the area north of Beni earlier this month and conducted humanitarian assessments in Oicha and Eringeti districts. Residents told our staff about brutal attacks against the civilians carried out with machetes. Stories of massacres, extortion, forced displacement and other human rights violations are frequent.

Sexual and gender-based violence is rampant across the Beni territory. Many children are being recruited as child soldiers. The violence is particularly rampant in the so-called “triangle of death,” between the towns of Eringeti, Mbau and Kamango, on the Uganda-DRC border, as well as in the towns of Beni, Oicha and Mavivi.

UNHCR teams witnessed empty villages, countless torched and abandoned houses, as well as burnt cars. Those who fled found shelter mostly in Beni and Oicha, where both host and displaced communities fall prey to brutal and unpredictable attacks. Beni town hosts more than 32,000 displaced people, with the majority forced to live with host families or in schools or churches. More than two thirds have been forced to flee in the last three months.

UNHCR teams found the vulnerable displaced indigenous communities to be in some of the most critical situations. Forced out of their areas of origin in the forests, their living conditions in makeshift sites are abysmal. Families are sleeping rough, barely protected from the elements by their flimsy shelters. They have few or no means of survival as they can no longer hunt in the forests, now under the control of armed groups. There’s a genuine risk of these people losing their culture and way of life.

UNHCR is scaling up its capacity in North Kivu to respond to the growing humanitarian needs. We are arranging additional emergency shelters and other humanitarian assistance to meet the needs of the displaced in Beni. While UNHCR’s humanitarian response is continuing despite the outbreak of Ebola, the prevailing security situation and drastic funding shortfall severely hamper our efforts. UNHCR’s DRC 2018 appeal totalling USD 201 million is only 17 per cent funded.

Governance – Venezuela

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UNHCR and IOM Chiefs Call for More Support as the Outflow of Venezuelans Rises Across the Region
2018-08-23
Geneva – The UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi and the Director General of the United Nations Migration Agency, IOM, William Lacy Swing appealed for greater support from the international community to the countries and communities in the region receiving a growing number of refugees and migrants from Venezuela. With an estimated 2.3 million Venezuelans living abroad, more than 1.6 million have left the country since 2015, 90 per cent of them to countries within South America.

Grandi and Swing commended States in the region for generously hosting Venezuelan nationals arriving at their borders. They nonetheless expressed concern over several recent developments affecting refugees and migrants from Venezuela. These include new passport and border entry requirements in Ecuador and Peru, as well as changes to the temporary stay permits for Venezuelans in Peru.

“We recognise the growing challenges associated with the large scale arrival of Venezuelans. It remains critical that any new measures continue to allow those in need of international protection to access safety and seek asylum,” stressed Grandi.

“We commend the efforts already made by receiving countries to provide Venezuelans with security, support and assistance. We trust that these demonstrations of solidarity will continue in the future,” said IOM´s Director General, Ambassador Swing, in Geneva Thursday.

Of particular concern are the most vulnerable—such as adolescent boys and girls, women, people trying to reunite with their families and unaccompanied and separated children who are unlikely to be able to meet documentation requirements and will therefore be placed at further risk of exploitation, trafficking and violence.

UNHCR, IOM, UN agencies and other partners are working in support of national responses by governments in the region to this complex human mobility and protection situation. This current situation underlines the urgent need to increase international engagement and solidarity in support of the governments’ response plans and addressing the most pressing humanitarian needs, in order to assure that those are met, safe transit is guaranteed and social and economic integration can be provided in line with larger development strategies.

Following the commitments of the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants, timely and predictable support by the international community is needed for fairer sharing of responsibilities and to complement the efforts of host countries.

::::::

Venezuela: General Secretariat Urges Countries to Ignore Extradition Requests from the Dictatorship
August 21. 2018
The General Secretariat of the Organization of American States (GS/OAS) calls on the competent authorities of the hemisphere to ignore all attempted acts by the illegitimate supreme court of justice operating in Caracas under the dictatorial regime, and in particular to dismiss extradition requests made by this body as contrary to the law.

Today the only democratic institutions in Venezuela due to their constitutional origin, their composition in accordance with constitutional procedures and their functions are: the National Assembly (a result of the elections of December 2015); the legitimate Supreme Court of Justice (in exile and whose magistrates were designated by the National Assembly); and the Attorney General (also in exile and illegitimately dismissed by the fraudulent National Constituent Assembly.)

Only the acts of these three institutions have the legitimacy and legality that demand compliance by all state entities in Venezuela, and their validation by the Inter-American and international community.

Venezuela is a dictatorship, the National Constituent Assembly was elected through fraud, and the Executive Power and the Electoral Power have illegitimate origins and the procedures for the composition of their highest magistrates have been either unconstitutional or fraudulent.

In addition to principles and values, there is a need to translate the legal and political consequences of the breakdown of the institutional order in Venezuela into practice.

In recent days we have witnessed spurious extradition requests made by the illegitimate supreme court of justice of the dictatorship headed by its illegal president Maikel Moreno.

These “extradition requests” linked to the alleged attack against Nicolás Maduro are flawed and should be ignored by the international community because the body that issues them is fraudulent, its members are impostors, and their positions illegal.

Humanitarian Response – Budget Constraint Strategies

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Optimal Targeting under Budget Constraints in a Humanitarian Context
World Bank – Policy Research Working Paper 8191 :: 25 pages
Chiara Gigliarano, Paolo Verme
Abstract
The combination of conflict, food insecurity, and displacement generates competing claims for financial resources that stretch the donors’ ability to provide funding and the humanitarian organizations’ capacity to provide social assistance. The paper uses Receiver Operating Characteristic curves and related indexes to determine the optimal targeting strategy of a food voucher program for refugees.

The estimations focus on the 2014 food vouchers administered by the World Food Programme to Syrian refugees in Jordan. The analysis uses data collected by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Based on a poverty model, Receiver Operating Characteristic curves are used to optimize coverage and leakage rates under budget constraints. The paper shows how policy makers can use these instruments to fine-tune targeting using coverage rates, budgets, or poverty lines as guiding principles to increase the overall efficiency of a program. As humanitarian organizations operate under increasing budget constraints and increasing demands for efficiency, the proposed approach addresses both concerns.

The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank and its affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.

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New Study Looks at How to Optimally Target Humanitarian Assistance When Budgets are Stretched – World Bank
Date: August 23, 2018 Type: Publication
As violent conflict surges, the world today faces multiple related crises – from forced displacement to food insecurity – that are driving up the need for humanitarian assistance. Yet budgets remain constrained, and humanitarian organizations are increasingly being forced to make tough choices, having to target resources as universal coverage of assistance programs becomes the exception rather than the rule.

In such situations, improving targeting can make the difference between life and death for some displaced people, says a new World Bank working paper, Optimal Targeting under Budget Constraints in a Humanitarian Context.

The paper aims to contribute to making targeting more effective when budgets are stretched. It utilizes Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) curves and related indices to devise a methodology for optimizing coverage, poverty reduction and leakage, focusing on social protection programs (cash transfers).

The proposed methodology can be used when policy makers work with coverage, poverty or budget targets. It looks at questions such as: (i) What is the budget required to reduce poverty (or mitigate famine) by X percent? (ii) What is the budget required to increase household coverage by Y percent? (iii) What is the coverage or poverty reduction we can obtain with a given Z budget? (iv) Can the program’s efficiency be improved by shifting the poverty line? The answers can help donors take funding decisions and humanitarian organizations make targeting choices.

As a case study, the paper uses the food voucher program administered by the World Food Programme (WFP) to Syrian refugees in Jordan in 2014, to show how this method can be applied, relying on available micro data collected by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).

The paper cautions that this method cannot be applied in all contexts. Quality micro data is not always available and outcomes such as nutrition levels may be more important than poverty reduction in emergency situations.

But all humanitarian operations with budget limitations that use cash or food vouchers as a form of social protection face the same targeting challenges, and operations may need to rely on less accurate targeting criteria.

“As we work with UNHCR and partners to improve the quality of micro data, this paper implicitly shows that collecting income or consumption data can also lead to improvements in the measurement of outcomes and in the effectiveness of targeting,” said co-author Paul Verme, World Bank lead economist.

Development – Disruptive Technologies

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World Bank Prices First Global Blockchain Bond, Raising A$110 Million
[Editor’s text bolding]
WASHINGTON/SYDNEY, August 23/24, 2018 – The World Bank launched bond-i (blockchain operated new debt instrument), the world’s first bond to be created, allocated, transferred and managed through its life cycle using distributed ledger technology. The two-year bond raised A$110 million, marking the first time that investors have supported the World Bank’s development activities in a transaction that is fully managed using the blockchain technology.

The World Bank mandated Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) as arranger for the bond on August 10. The announcement was followed by a two-week consultation period with the market, with key investors indicating strong support for the issuance.

Investors in the bond include CBA, First State Super, NSW Treasury Corporation, Northern Trust, QBE, SAFA, and Treasury Corporation of Victoria. CBA and the World Bank will continue to welcome investor interest in the bond throughout its life cycle, and inquiries from other market participants in relation to the platform.

The bond is part of a broader strategic focus of the World Bank to harness the potential of disruptive technologies for development. In June 2017, the World Bank launched a Blockchain Innovation Lab to understand the impact of blockchain and other disruptive technologies in areas such as land administration, supply chain management, health, education, cross-border payments, and carbon market trading.

Arunma Oteh, World Bank Treasurer, said: “I am delighted that this pioneer bond transaction using the distributed ledger technology, bond-i, was extremely well received by investors. We are particularly impressed with the breath of interest from official institutions, fund managers, and banks. We were no doubt successful in moving from concept to reality because these high-quality investors understood the value of leveraging technology for innovation in capital markets…

Featured Journal Content – GBV Services Delivery

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Health Policy and Planning
Volume 33, Issue 7, 1 September 2018,
https://academic.oup.com/heapol/issue/33/7
Original Articles
Evaluation of a mobile approach to gender-based violence service delivery among Syrian refugees in Lebanon
Pamela Lilleston [plillston@gmail.com]; Liliane Winograd; Spogmay Ahmed; Dounia Salamé; Dayana Al Alam …
Health Policy and Planning, Volume 33, Issue 7, 1 September 2018, Pages 767–776, https://doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czy050
Abstract
As the landscape of humanitarian response shifts from camp-based to urban- and informal-tented settlement-based responses, service providers and policymakers must consider creative modes for delivering health services. Psychosocial support and case management can be life-saving services for refugee women and girls who are at increased risk for physical, sexual and psychological gender-based violence (GBV). However, these services are often unavailable in non-camp refugee settings. We evaluated an innovative mobile service delivery model for GBV response and mitigation implemented by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in Lebanon. In October 2015, we conducted in-depth interviews with IRC staff (n=11), Syrian refugee women (n=40) and adolescent girls (n=26) to explore whether the mobile services meet the support needs of refugees and uphold international standards for GBV service delivery. Recruitment was conducted via purposive sampling. Data were analysed using deductive and inductive approaches in NVivo. Findings suggest that by providing free, flexible service delivery in women’s own communities, the mobile model overcame barriers that limited women’s and girls’ access to essential services, including transportation, checkpoints, cost and gendered expectations around mobility and domestic responsibilities. Participants described the services as strengthening social networks, reducing feelings of idleness and isolation, and increasing knowledge and self-confidence. Results indicate that the model requires skilled, creative staff who can assess community readiness for activities, quickly build trust and ensure confidentiality in contexts of displacement and disruption. Referring survivors to legal and medical services was challenging in a context with limited access to quality services. The IRC’s mobile service delivery model is a promising approach for accessing hard-to-reach refugee populations with critical GBV services.