One in Three in G7 Ignorant About AIDS

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters)Nov. 29th. - One in three adults in the world's top industrial democracies say they know little or nothing about AIDS, a disease thought to have killed more than 28 million people in the past 26 years, a poll showed on Thursday. But the survey, carried out by Ipsos for the World Vision charity, found that in the seven countries studied, 44 percent of respondents would be willing to pay more taxes to combat AIDS, including 50 percent in the United States.

More than 3,500 people in the United States, Canada, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Japan -- the Group of Eight countries minus Russia -- were interviewed for the survey, released ahead of U.N. World AIDS Day on Saturday. Richard Stearns, president of World Vision U.S., a Christian group that says it combats poverty and injustice worldwide, told a United Nations news conference that millions were ignorant of AIDS because it was "not real" for them. "It's not personal, it is somebody else's problem and somebody else's disease, and very often in a place very, very far away and remote from their everyday lives," he said.

AIDS, which attacks the immune system and can be spread by sexual contact or blood transfusion, was first detected in the United States in 1981. World Vision says some 6,000 children a day currently lose a parent to AIDS. The Ipsos poll found that in the countries surveyed, Canadians were the most concerned about AIDS and Japanese the least. Japan was also the country where the most people -- 53 percent -- admitted to little or no knowledge of the disease. Germans said they were the most knowledgeable, with 80 percent claiming to know "some" or "a lot" about the issue. The comparable figure for the United States was 70 percent. In the countries taken together, one in four people thought the AIDS problem had been "greatly exaggerated" by the media, the survey said. Nevertheless, Stearns said he believed the citizens of the countries polled were "ahead of their governments" in their view of how much should be done to fight AIDS. "I think that goes contrary to the view in Washington," he said. "I don't think Washington realizes that that many Americans care about AIDS at that level. "So in a way it gives them the political cover to do more because ... when you have 50 percent of the country saying 'you could raise my taxes if you could use that money to do more for HIV and AIDS,' that's a message that our politicians I think are not aware of," he said.

The United Nations says some 33 million people worldwide are infected by HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, including those who have developed the illness.
By Patrick Worsnip
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Rights Advocate Fights Back

JIDDAH, Saudi Arabia, Nov. 28 (Washington Post) -- A human rights lawyer who has defended a gang-rape victim sentenced to jail time and lashes said Wednesday that he is suing the Justice Ministry for revoking his license and for defaming his client by accusing her of having an affair. Abdul-Rahman al-Lahem's license was suspended this month in the eastern town of Qatif, where his client was sentenced to six months in jail and 200 lashes on a morals charge after she and a male companion were kidnapped by seven men and raped.

The Justice Ministry said in a statement last week that the 20-year-old married woman had "confessed to having an affair with the man she was caught with." The statement also said she was not fully clothed when she and her male companion were seized at knifepoint. "The Justice Ministry's accusing my client of adultery, without proof, is illegal. It is a crime, and they, better than anyone else, should know that," Lahem said. "I am suing them to protect my client's honor and because no one, including the Justice Ministry, should be above the law." The Saudi National Human Rights Association, a government-financed group, has requested an explanation for the revocation of Lahem's license by the Qatif court. "We are questioning the legality of them taking his permit," said Saleh al-Khathlan, a member of the group. "We are hoping that this is not a reaction to his being so active in the field of human rights and his criticisms of the system, and that they're not trying to punish him for being so outspoken."

The victim, known only as the Girl of Qatif, her home town, was in a car with the male acquaintance, trying to retrieve old pictures of herself, when the attack occurred last year, Lahem said. The woman and her companion were originally sentenced to 90 lashes for being alone in a car, illegal in this strictly gender-segregated country because they are not related. The rapists received sentences ranging from 10 months to five years. When the sentences were appealed, a superior court increased the punishment of both victims and nearly doubled the rapists' sentences. Lashes are usually administered 50 at a time in a private room in prison. On a satellite television program Tuesday, Abdul-Mohsen al-Obaikan, a Justice Ministry consultant and former judge, said the woman was to blame for the sentences, which he described as lenient. "Nobody accepts that his wife cheats on him, and that she betrays her marital vows and sullies her marital bed," he said.
By Faiza Saleh Ambah
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US, Japan, France Get Low Aid Ranking

Nov. 29th. (Financial Times) Sweden, Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands have been ranked as the top four aid donors in providing relief for humanitarian disasters, according to a new index published on Thursday. The study, launched by Kofi Annan, the former United Nations secretary-general, ranks 23 aid donors from the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development according to the effectiveness and impartiality of their relief efforts in eight crisis-hit countries.

In contrast to the Scandinavian nations, major donors such as the US, Japan and France rank in the bottom half of the index, with low scores for tests such as impartiality and implementing international humanitarian laws. France is criticised for its failure to work effectively with other aid agencies. The humanitarian response index, drawn up by Dara International, a Madrid-based evaluation agency, ranks the European Commission in fifth place, in spite of frequent criticism of its bureaucratic procedures. The UK ranks ninth, Germany 13th, and the US 16th out of the 23. The bottom two countries are Italy and Greece.

2006 International Aid Donated (Official Development Assistance)

COUNTRY	For each $100 earned in the country, how much is donated in aid	Aid as % of income	How close the country is to reaching the 0.7% goal
Sweden	103 cents	1.03	Already reached goal
Luxembourg	89 cents	0.89	Already reached goal
Norway	89 cents	0.89	Already reached goal
Netherlands	81 cents	0.81	Already reached goal
Denmark	80 cents	0.80	Already reached goal
Ireland	53 cents	0.53	Scheduled to reach in 2012
United Kingdom	52 cents	0.52	Scheduled to reach in 2013
Belgium	50 cents	0.50	Scheduled to reach in 2010
Austria	48 cents	0.48	Scheduled to reach in 2015
France	47 cents	0.47	Scheduled to reach in 2012
Switzerland	39 cents	0.39	No schedule yet
Finland	39 cents	0.39	Scheduled to reach in 2010
Germany	36 cents	0.36	Scheduled to reach in 2014
Spain	32 cents	0.32	Scheduled to reach in 2012
Canada	30 cents	0.30	No schedule yet
Australia	30 cents	0.30	No schedule yet
New Zealand	27 cents	0.27	No schedule yet
Japan	25 cents	0.25	No schedule yet
Portugal	21 cents	0.21	Scheduled to reach in 2015
Italy	20 cents	0.20	Scheduled to reach in 2015
United States	17 cents	0.17	No schedule yet
Greece	16 cents	0.16	Scheduled to reach in 2015

Source: OECD

Details
Poverty keeps hungry people from buying enough food to nourish themselves. Poverty keeps sick people from receiving basic medical treatment or taking simple preventative measures. The vast majority of these preventable deaths occur among the poorest people in the poorest countries.
In September 2000, the 189 countries of the United Nations unanimously agreed to “spare no effort to free our fellow men, women and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty,” specifically hunger and the “major diseases that afflict humanity.” To accomplish this great objective would be expensive, and the price was later estimated at about $195 billion a year. It would be very difficult for this amount of money to be raised by private charities or individuals. It would require the combined efforts of governments throughout the world to do it. In the September 2002 Johannesburg Summit, these same 22 counties re-affirmed their commitment to reach the 0.7% goal. This would provide enough money to raise the $195 billion per year.
Why the 0.7% Agreement?
The countries made this agreement because they realized that it was hard for each country on its own to give a consistent, minimum level of aid each year. Despite good intentions, a country would find that the aid it wanted to give was eaten away by competing political interests, concern about budget deficits, “problems at home,” “problems abroad,” and so on. So they agreed to a minimal, flat rate that each country could afford each year regardless of its current political or economic state. The 0.7% figure may sound complicated, but it is actually quite simple. You take the total income earned by all the people in the country and then the government gives 0.7% (seven tenths of one percent) of that as aid. Or to look at it another way: for every $100 earned in the country, the country gives 70 cents in aid.
How are the countries doing?
As the chart above shows, five countries have already met the goal to give 0.7% of their income in international aid: Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden. In 2002 and 2003, five other countries set up a schedule to give 0.7%: Belgium, Ireland, Finland, France, and Spain. In July 2004, the United Kingdom set up a schedule to give 0.7%. In April 2005, Germany set up a schedule to give 0.7%. In May 2005, Austria, Greece, Italy, and Portugal set up a schedule to give 0.7%. It was not easy for many of the countries to set up a schedule to reach the 0.7% goal. In some cases, such as Britain and Germany, it took the combined effort of many thousands of citizens writing and petitioning their government to get it done.
The remaining six countries
Only six countries have not yet set up a schedule to give 0.7%. These are Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Switzerland, and the United States. To raise the $195 billion a year, these six will need to reach the goal. These six countries are all democracies. All that is necessary for them to reach the 0.7% goal is for enough of their citizens to show their support.

Sources: UN Millennium Project, United Nations Development Program (UNDP), The End of Poverty (Jeffrey D. Sachs), Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

International Aid ― A Solution
Quick Summary: Almost all of the deaths from hunger and disease can be stopped. The cost to do this is about $195 billion a year, according to the United Nations. Twenty-two developed countries above have pledged to work towards each giving 0.7% (a little less than 1%) of their national income in international aid, which would raise the $195 billion. Some countries are slow to meet their pledge.
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Ethiopia 'bogged down' in Somalia

BBC Nov. 28th: Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has acknowledged that his troops cannot withdraw from the conflict in Somalia. Mr Meles said he had expected to withdraw his soldiers earlier in the year, after Islamists had been driven out of the Somali capital, Mogadishu. But he said divisions within the Somali government had left it unable to replace the Ethiopians, while not enough peacekeepers had arrived. Some 60% of Mogadishu residents have fled clashes in the city, the UN says.

The Ethiopians intervened a year ago to oust the Union of Islamic Courts, which had taken control of much of southern Somalia. Their presence is unpopular in Mogadishu and earlier this month, insurgents dragged the bodies of Ethiopian troops through the city. "Having done the main work, we had the belief and expectations that a situation would be created for us to be able to withdraw," Mr Meles told MPs. "However, this belief and expectations could not be met according to our plan.

He has always said the Ethiopians would pull out when a peacekeeping force was deployed. But only 1,600 Ugandans have arrived, from a planned 8,000-strong African Union force. The UN is divided on plans for it take over the mission. UN chief Ban Ki-moon says it is too dangerous to send troops to Mogadishu. The UN refugee agency says one million people have fled their homes in Somalia, including 200,000 this month, following the latest clashes between insurgents and the Ethiopian-backed government. Last week, new Somali Prime Minister Nur Adde said he wanted to hold talks with the opposition. Somalia has not had a functioning national government since President Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991.
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Sudan Continues to Obstruct Peacekeepers, U.N. Official Charges

UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 27 (Washington Post) -- Sudan's government has imposed a series of new bureaucratic obstacles that undermine the ability of a U.N.-backed peacekeeping mission in Darfur to protect civilians and its own troops there, according to the United Nations' top peacekeeping official. Jean-Marie Guéhenno, the U.N. undersecretary general for peacekeeping, told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday that Sudan has insisted that international troops provide Sudan the authority to "temporarily disable" the mission's communications network if Sudanese forces are engaged in a military operation and to provide advance notice of all the mission's troop movements.

The latest Sudanese restrictions came to light just five weeks before a joint U.N. African Union mission of 26,000 peacekeepers is scheduled to formally replace a smaller African Union force in the Darfur region. The moves threatened to derail a U.S.-backed diplomatic effort at the United Nations to restore calm in one of Africa's deadliest regions. Abdalmahmood Abdalhaleem Mohamad, Sudan's ambassador to the United Nations, denied that his government was dragging its feet, saying that Guéhenno was blowing out of proportion a "small technical" dispute. The ambassador said the U.N. peacekeeping department has developed a habit of blaming Sudan for its own failure to meet its schedule for deploying a force in Darfur. Gu¿henno said Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir is backtracking from his commitments to support an international mission in Darfur, and the undersecretary appealed to the Security Council and influential African governments to persuade Khartoum to cooperate more fully. "A strategic decision on the part of the government of Sudan is necessary if we are to achieve our common goal: peace and security in Darfur," he said.

The violence in Darfur began in February 2003, when two Darfurian rebel groups took up arms against the country's Islamic government. A government-backed counterinsurgency campaign has driven more than 2 million civilians from their homes and led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands more. The United Nations' top political envoy, Jan Eliasson of Sweden, told the council that more than 30,000 people have been displaced by fighting between government and rebel forces over the past month. In recent weeks, Sudan has engaged in bureaucratic delays that raise concern about its commitment to the new peacekeeping mission, Guéhenno said. Khartoum has yet to grant the mission authority to conduct night flights in Darfur or to deploy six helicopters in an airfield close to its headquarters in El Fasher. The government has impounded U.N. communications equipment in the El Fasher airport for weeks and has yet to grant land for encampments in the towns of El Geneina and Zalingei. "If the government doesn't give us the land we need immediately, we will have to hold back some units," Guéhenno said. Khartoum refused to authorize the participation of non-African troops whose role is vital to the mission's success, according to Guéhenno. The new Sudanese demands, he said, "would make it impossible for the mission to operate."

Guéhenno also raised concern about new reports that two Darfurian rebel factions have threatened an advance unit of Chinese military engineers. And he faulted the U.N. membership for failing to provide the mission with trucks, as well as transport and attack helicopters. "Do we move ahead with the deployment of a force that will not make a difference," Guéhenno asked, "that will not have the capability to defend itself, and that carries the risk of humiliation of the Security Council and the United Nations and tragic failure for the people of Darfur?"
Colum Lynch"
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Pope Creates 23 New Cardinals

VATICAN CITY (AFP) — 23 new cardinals knelt before Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday to accept their birettas -- square red hats -- during a time-honoured ceremony inducting them into the elite body that advises and elects popes. The 23 new "princes of the Church," of whom five are 80 or older and thus ineligible to vote in a papal election, fill out the ranks of the College of Cardinals to 201, including 120 cardinals who will be tasked with choosing his successor. "Dear brothers, as you enter the College of Cardinals, the Lord asks you and entrusts you with the service of love: love for God, love for his Church ... with maximum and unconditional dedication," the pope told the freshmen in Saint Peter's Basilica. Using the Latin phrase "usque ad sanguinis effusionem" (to the point of spilling blood), the pope reminded the new cardinals that their red robes signify their willingness to die for their faith.

The 80-year-old head of the Roman Catholic Church was clad in a gold embroidered cope or mantle from the 15th century and the mitre of his 19th-century predecessor Pius IX, underscoring his fondness for the liturgical splendours of the past. In his homily, Benedict singled out the elevation of the patriarch of Babylon for the Chaldeans, which he said reflected his wish to express his spiritual closeness and affection for the Iraqi people. "How can one not turn one's gaze with apprehension and affection, in this moment of joy, to the dear Christian communities in Iraq?" he asked, drawing loud applause from the prelates assembled in Saint Peter's Basilica. Emmanuel III Delly, the 80-year-old spiritual leader of Iraqi Christians, said Friday that the honour was for "all Iraqis."

The cardinals, their red robes overlaid with white surplices symbolising purity, then accepted their red birettas from the pope in the solemn ritual known as a consistory. In a brief salute to the pope on behalf of all the new cardinals, prelate Leonardo Sandri said: "We are ready to follow you when ... you teach that marriage and family are the original unit of society, that life extends from conception to its natural end." The freshmen are the second group of cardinals created by Benedict since his election in April 2005, having inducted 15 in March last year. Announced five weeks ago, the new influx does not alter the geographical balance of the College of Cardinals, which is heavily weighted in favour of Europe. Thirteen Europeans join two North Americans, four Latin Americans, two Africans and two Asians in the new group. Europe accounts for an ever-shrinking percentage of the overall Catholic population, while nearly half of the world's Catholics are in Latin America, which combined with Africa and Asia make up some two-thirds of the 1.1 billion-strong Church.

Vatican expert John Allen of the National Catholic Reporter noted after the nominations were announced last month: "Unconsciously (the pope) is perpetuating a situation in which the electoral college of the Church is increasingly unrepresentative of the people at the grassroots." Some three-quarters of the cardinals are the heads of the Church's largest archdioceses, while most of the rest head departments of the Vatican administration known as congregations. The new cardinals include seven Vatican prelates and 11 archbishops of key cities including Paris, Spain's Valencia and Barcelona, Sao Paulo in Brazil, Mumbai in India and Dakar in Senegal. From Africa there is also Nairobi Archbishop John Njue.

The new cardinals were to receive the gold ring of their high office during a mass on Sunday. On Friday, Benedict held a closed-door meeting with all the cardinals to discuss the Church's relations with other Christian faiths. The participants noted a "thaw" in ties with the Russian Orthodox Church but continuing difficulties with Protestant churches because of differences over "ethical questions," according to a Vatican communique. The cardinals hailed recent "encouraging signs" in the Holy See's relations with Islam, notably with an appeal for dialogue by 138 Muslim leaders, and Pope Benedict's meeting at the Vatican earlier this month with Saudi King Abdullah, the statement said.
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