HOMETOWN SHAKEDOWN is TODAY
THE HOMETOWN SHAKEDOWN IS ON
The Hometown Shakedown goes down TODAY. If you haven’t felt it yet, the Hometown Shakedown is on. You might want to grab on to something stable or get under a doorframe.
If you haven’t heard yet, the LRA Disarmament Bill passed its first big test yesterday. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee affirmed the bill unanimously, moving the bill one step closer to President Obama’s desk. This is a colossal pat on the back for all of our efforts, but the time for celebration is yet to come. We still have a lot of work to do.
Today, we’re visiting the offices of over 30 congressional representatives to tell them one thing: we need their support and co-sponsorship of the LRA Disarmament Bill. Across the nation, supporters like you will be swarming the hometown offices of several senators and representatives who are key authorities in the fate of the LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act.
Never before have we been this close to seeing landmark legislation passed regarding Joseph Kony’s ruthless charge.
For that reason, we need your help. If you’re reading this, go to WeWantObama.com, type in your zip code and find the info to call and email your representatives asking them to support the Bill. Then, visit www.invisiblechildren.com for up-to-date information on the Shakedown. All day, we’ll be giving you pictures, videos, and stories of the emerging developments, and streaming live, via Facebook, to keep you updated. Find out how you can lend your voice in support of this bill, and tell your representative how much their assistance means to you.
Click here to see a brand new video, featuring never-before-seen footage of Invisible Children’s recent interview with International Criminal Court lead prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo. Hear what he has to say about why our role is so important in the pursuit of Joseph Kony, and how all of us are having an unprecedented effect on international efforts.
The MOST IMPORTANT thing you can do, is try to attend one of the 30 most important meetings (see no. 1 below) shown in this link: MEETING LOCATIONS <– if you can drive, fly, or crawl to one of these… by all means do it.
Join us.
THE HOMETOWN SHAKEDOWN: Wednesday, November 18th, 2009.
1st step a success! This is huge. Read this!
“Dear all –
I just wanted to let you know the LRA Disarmament & Northern Uganda Recovery Act, S.1067, was passed unanimously this afternoon by Senate Foreign Relations Committee in a voice vote. We’ll be sending out a press release soon. This is a huge step forward to getting it past in the Senate and ultimately by all of Congress. Thanks for all your support and help thus far. The next step for us is ramping up the # of cosponsors so we can try to pass it through the whole Senate next month with unanimous consent.
All the best,
Senator Feingold’s office.”
Here is the press release:
SENATE COMMITTEE PASSES FEINGOLD BILL REQUIRING NEW STRATEGY TO CONFRONT THE LRA
Feingold’s Bipartisan Legislation Would Bring New Attention and Support to Ending Africa’s Longest Running Rebel War
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Washington, D.C. – The Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed bipartisan legislation today authored by U.S. Senator Russ Feingold and cosponsored by Sam Brownback (R-KS) requiring the Obama administration to develop a new multifaceted strategy to confront one of Africa’s longest running rebel groups, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). For more than two decades, under the leadership of Joseph Kony, the LRA has kidnapped more than 66,000 children and forced them to fight as child soldiers, wreaking havoc in northern Uganda and southern Sudan, and more recently, northeastern Congo and Central African Republic. Feingold’s bipartisan Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act requires the United States to work with multilateral partners to develop a viable path to disarm the LRA, while ensuring the protection of civilians.
“For too long, Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army have terrorized innocent civilians across four countries of central Africa, kidnapping thousands of children and forcing them to become child soldiers and commit horrific acts,” said Feingold, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on African Affairs, who visited Uganda in 2007. “My bill will commit the United States to develop a proactive strategy to work with regional governments to stop the LRA, while better targeting our assistance to address the conditions in northern Uganda that enabled the LRA to emerge in the first place. I will work with my colleagues to move this important piece of legislation through the Senate.”
“The LRA’s 30-year campaign of violence has scarred communities across central Africa, who have in turn been let down by their governments, the UN and the international donor community,” said Jon Elliott, Africa Advocacy Director at Human Rights Watch. “This Bill offers an opportunity to put civilian protection where it should be, at the top of the agenda, and much-needed American leadership to finally bring Joseph Kony and his co-accused to justice. And it will hopefully ensure that victims receive the support and redress they need to rebuild their lives.”
Feingold’s bill authorizes $10 million in additional funding for humanitarian assistance for those areas outside of Uganda now directly affected by the LRA’s brutality. In this year alone, the UN reports that the LRA has killed more than 1,500 people, abducted over 1,800, and displaced hundreds of thousands of people in Central African Republic, Congo and southern Sudan. Feingold’s bill also authorizes $30 million over three years for transitional justice and reconciliation to encourage and help the Ugandan government to address the grievances and regional divisions that the LRA exploited for nearly two decades. The Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act is cosponsored by Sam Brownback (R-KS) and 25 other senators, including several members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Germany arrests top Rwanda rebels
Police in Germany have arrested two Rwandan militia leaders on suspicion of crimes committed in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Ignace Murwanashyaka, the leader of the FDLR rebel group, and his aide Straton Musoni were held on suspicion of crimes against humanity and war crimes.
FDLR leaders fled to DR Congo after the Rwanda genocide in which some 800,000 people – mostly ethnic Tutsis – died. The FDLR’s presence in DR Congo has been at the heart of years of unrest. The arrests come as UN peacekeepers continue to help the Congolese army battle the FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda).
The operation has been underway since January but the FDLR remains active.
Facts:
IGNACE MURWANASHYAKA
- Ethnic Hutu, aged 46
- Been in Germany since before Rwanda genocide
- Denies charges his men are linked to genocide
- Says fighting for democracy in Rwanda
- Commands 5-6,000 men
- FDLR said to smuggle gold from DR Congo to buy weapons
- Accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity
- Accused of killings, rape, looting and conscripting child soldiers in DR Congo
- The FDLR is accused of funding its arms purchases by smuggling gold and other minerals from areas it controls in the North and South Kivu provinces, just across the border from Rwanda.
Mr Murwanaskyaka, 46, was arrested in the city of Karlsruhe, while 48-year-old Mr Musoni was held in the Stuttgart area, German prosecutors said in a statement. The statement said that the pair were the leader and deputy leader of the FDLR.
“The accused are strongly suspected, as members of the foreign terrorist organisation FDLR, of committing crimes against humanity and war crimes,” it said. It added that “FDLR militias are believed to have killed several hundred civilians, raped numerous women, plundered and burned countless villages, forcing villagers from their homes and recruiting numerous children as soldiers”.
Lobby group Human Rights Watch (HRW) has welcomed the arrests. “Our research clearly indicates that Mr Murwanashyaka has a powerful influence over the FDLR militia who have deliberately targeted and killed hundreds of civilians in eastern Congo and that he is directly linked to the crimes,” said HRW DR Congo expert Anneke Van Woudenberg. “Mr Murwanashyaka’s arrest on war crimes and crimes against humanity is a welcome step to bringing justice for these brutal crimes,” she added.
Mr Murwanashyaka, an ethnic Hutu, has lived in Germany since before the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. He has always denied that his men, believed to number 5-6,000, were involved in the genocide and says they are fighting to bring democracy to Rwanda.
He was among 15 people whose assets were frozen by the Security Council in 2005 on suspicion of involvement in war crimes in Rwanda or DR Congo.
EYEWITNESS:
Mark Doyle, BBC News
“There is no doubt that Ignace Murwanashyaka has had direct command and control over some of the illegal mining activities of Rwandan rebels operating in eastern DR Congo. I know, because when I travelled in the area earlier this year with a BBC team, it was he who gave us permission to enter the rebel mining strongholds in the South Kivu region. I had sought permission from rebel officers on the ground. All of these officers declined to give us permission to enter their area until Mr Murwanashyaka agreed. It was a public relations gaffe on the rebels’ part, however, because we managed to prove, despite rebel denials, that they were deeply involved in illegal mineral mining.”
The FDLR’s presence in eastern DR Congo has led to years of fighting in the region, and Rwanda’s Tutsi-dominated government has twice invaded, saying it is trying to wipe them out.
Some FDLR leaders have been accused of involvement in the Rwandan genocide.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/8364507.stm
Published: 2009/11/17 17:52:32 GMT
BBC: LRA commander responsible for Christmas massacre surrenders
Arop surrendered to Ugandan troops in the DRC
BBC: LRA rebel surrenders in DR Congo
Charles Arop, believed to be behind a brutal attack last Christmas, handed himself in to the Ugandan military.
Fighters believed to be part of his unit used machetes and sticks to kill at least 143 people and abducted 160 children in eastern DR Congo.
The LRA’s decades-long rebellion has spread from Uganda to several of its neighbours in recent years.
Ugandan special forces have been hunting the LRA through the DR Congo, the Central African Republic, and Sudan in an operation called “Lighting Thunder”. (more…)
VIDEO: The LRA in South Sudan
As Enough’s LRA field researcher Ledio recently reported, attacks by the brutal Lord’s Resistance Army, notorious for its tactic of abducting children, have spiked in Western Equatoria State in southern Sudan. Here’s an excellent video by Time reporter Ed Robbins about the devastating impact of the rebel attacks on the local communities in WES: Time Video
The new US point man on war crimes: Stephen Rapp
New US ambassador for war crimes Stephen Rapp knows firsthand what it takes to prosecute man’s inhumanity to man. The former Iowa district attorney has already prosecuted participants in the Rwanda genocide and former Liberian strongman Charles Taylor.
The United States is much criticized abroad for its attitude toward international justice and world courts. The charge in Europe and Africa is that the US wants universal law for others but not for itself.
But in Mr. Rapp, who took up his duties Sept. 8, President Obama has found someone who international justice advocates expect will deepen US engagement in crimes against humanity cases.
For instance, Rapp favors an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation of Kenya’s 2007-08 postelection violence and wants an investigation into September’s soccer stadium killings and rape in Guinea. “Mass crimes against humanity are not acceptable … and the US will be more engaged,” Rapp told a conference of jurists in Madrid earlier this month.
“[Rapp] comes to the job with experience in international criminal justice,” says Stuart Alford, a London barrister and chair of the War Crimes Committee of the International Bar Association. “He understands the difficulties of putting on trial men like Charles Taylor. He knows the security issues involved, and the reconciliation issues within the region, including Liberia. To have someone from the US with that kind of background is encouraging.”
From Iowa to Rwanda
Rapp is known to have “prosecutorial zeal.” Four days after being tapped to take charge of the Rwanda tribunal in 2005, “I was on the plane to Kigali,” he said in a Monitor interview. Rapp brought his whole family from Iowa and says he wants to spend his life “bringing justice to places that have never had it before.”
Rapp, who traveled to Africa in a small Beechcraft airplane that often packed lawyers and defendants together, has prosecuted cases centered on violence against women, child soldier recruitment, and the use of the media to create and direct genocide.
In Rwanda, he prosecuted the “media case,” mainly against radio station RTLM, which infamously implored Hutus to kill the “cockroaches” or Tutsi minority in the 1994 genocide. The case took 34 months. The judges found that RTLM was not only a mass mechanism for inciting violence, but also a logistical tool for genocide – directing troops and reading the license tag numbers of Tutsi cars to machete-wielding men waiting at checkpoints.
The Guardian: US pledges $246m in aid to Uganda
The US is to give Uganda $246m (UShs 461bn) in aid to revive health, agriculture and trade, it was announced this weekend.
On Saturday, the US assistant secretary of state, Johnnie Carson, signed an agreement with Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni, the Daily Monitor reported today. The money is the largest single amount given to Uganda directly from another government for years, said the paper.
The Ugandan government announced that some of the money would be fed into the UShs1.1tr peace, recovery and development plan (PRDP) intended to regenerate the northern regions of the country that were affected by 20 years of fighting between the government and the Lord’s Resistance Army. The three-year plan was launched in October last year, but was suspended in January to allow for better accounting and monitoring practices to be designed.
Uganda has been the beneficiary of other significant bilateral support to the PRDP. The UK government’s Department for International Development has stated that one of its priorities in Uganda was to help rebuild the north of the country.
The Monitor reported that the US money will also fund HIV/Aids, environmental conservation and conflict mitigation programmes.
During Saturday’s bilateral talks, Museveni assured the US contingent that the country’s expected windfall from oil would not be misappropriated. “There is no possibility of this oil money being a curse for Uganda as it will not be used for consumption or salaries,” he reportedly said.
Read more here at The Guardian’s website.
Enough Project: Report from Southern Sudan
Western Equatoria, Sudan – “Tell them about our suffering here,” said the Bishop of Yambio of the Sudanese Episcopal Church. “The LRA is killing, raping and looting in our communities and the world does not know about it,” he added.
Bishop Peter’s words came at the end of a meeting I had with Episcopalian pastors from various Western Equatorian districts in South Sudan. Packed in the All Saints Church in Yambio, the capital of Western Equatoria State, or WES, I heard many hours-worth of testimony from people who had been victims of the Lord’s Resistance Army, or LRA, most of them in the past two months.
The village of Yubu, for instance, which is 4 km away from Yambio, was attacked at the end of September. Many people were abducted, some were released but at least six were killed. The remnants of their bodies were collected only a few days before my visit. These events have become common in WES. A report by the U.N. coordination agency estimated 202 LRA related deaths and 131 abductions in September alone.
LRA attacks on the civilian population have been particularly brutal and frequent in and around Ezo, a town close to Sudan’s border with Congo, where the LRA attackers are coming from. As a result, many people have been internally displaced, moving to areas as far as Yambio – a 7 to 10 day trek on foot – trying to escape the LRA.
The displaced people I spoke to in Yambio described how the LRA had destroyed most of their villages around Ezo in search of food. Stories of killings, rape, and looting are again, all too common. There are at least 1,500 displaced people around Yambio living in squalid conditions without much help. An estimated 25,000 people in WES are displaced and most are thought to have fled LRA attacks.
The number of refugees from Congo and Central African Republic are also on the rise. The refugee camp of Makpandu, 45 km northeast of Yambio town, currently houses over 2,500 refugees, and at least 50 people arrive each week, according to the U.N. refugee agency. At least 3,000 refugees are stuck in Ezo town where food distribution is rare due to LRA attacks, but relocation of these refugees to the Makpandu site is on hold until the security situation improves.
In the meantime, LRA attacks in Western Equatoria continue. On October 7, the LRA attacked the village of Nimba near Yambio town. Two women were mutilated and killed.
The attacks have prompted more displacement, misery, and hunger. Food supplies for the local population and the displaced are dwindling because of the looting and destruction. On Wednesday, Governor Jemma Nunu Kumba of Western Equatoria appealed on Radio Miraya FM for swift humanitarian aid to the people of WES. The governor’s plea echoed the words of the director of the Sudanese Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Committee in our meeting: “We had never had people dying of starvation in Western Equatoria until the LRA came.”
- Ledeo Cakaj, Enough Project. Read more of his work at Enough’s blog here.
BBC: UN winds down Sierra Leone court
A UN-backed court in Sierra Leone has dealt with its last case after seven years investigating atrocities from the country’s decade-long civil war. Thousands were killed, mutilated and raped in the war, which ended in 2002. The court has spent millions of dollars prosecuting suspects from all sides – money that critics say should have been spent on development projects. In the Freetown court’s final hearing, judges upheld the convictions of three rebel leaders. The only remaining case is that of Liberia’s ex-President Charles Taylor, who is currently on trial in The Hague. He is accused of backing rebels from the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in an attempt to overthrow Sierra Leone’s government.
‘Heroes’ on trial
Judges at the Freetown court upheld lengthy jail sentences against RUF leaders Issa Sesay, Maurice Kallon and Augustine Gbao for a catalogue of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Issa Sesay (C) will spend at least 52 years in jail
The BBC’s correspondent in the region, Caspar Leighton, says the court’s closure has left many Sierra Leoneans with a mixed experience of international justice. The court was set up by the UN and Sierra Leone’s government in 2002 to punish crimes regardless of who committed them. But all sides in the civil war committed atrocities and our correspondent says most Sierra Leoneans have an idea of who were the heroes and who were the villains. Many of them balked at seeing Sam Hinga Norman, the leader of the Civilian Defence Force militia, in the dock. He had been a hero for the people of Freetown, fighting hard against the RUF rebels – but his forces committed atrocities. Mr Hinga Norman died during his trial.
The notorious leader of the RUF rebels, Foday Sankoh, also died while on trial.
Click here to read more.
GUESS + Vanity Fair + IC = Epic party
We love her. Period.
Our favorite human in Hollywood, Kristen Bell, hosted a party for Invisible Children last night in Beverly Hills. Along with co-hosts Rachel Bilson and the amazing Pete Wentz, the trio launched a new line of Guess t-shirts that support Invisible Children. Vanity Fair magazine also co-hosted the party, and has become a great supporter of ours. We are so insanely honored by these people!
The shirts, made with Edun Organic Cotton grown and harvested in Uganda, were the brainchild of Caroline and Olivia Marciano. These girls, both daughters of Guess CEO Maurice Marciano, have become some of Invisible Children’s strongest activists, throwing events and spreading the word throughout Los Angeles. They are heroes of ours and we are so proud of all that they have done. As usual, it is the young people that surprise the world with their capacity to do big things that make a difference.
The t-shirts will be in every Guess store across the US starting Monday, and 100% of the sale price goes to Invisible Children. It is a huge commitment from Guess to Invisible Children, and we can’t thank them enough.
Not to mention, now Rachel is totally on board to go to Uganda. She has the fire in her eyes to do something big, and we love to see our supporters get that crazy look in their eye… where nothing seems impossible, not even getting Obama. When Kristen and Rachel invade northern Uganda it’s going to be an amazing trip… those girls will leave with thousands of new friends and a new understanding for the impact Invisible Children is having on the ground in Uganda. We know it happened with Pete when he and the rest of Fallout Boy went over. We will keep you posted on the trip if/when it finally happens.
Olivia and Caroline. Our heroes.
I’ll post more pictures from the event last night as they come it.
You can find the t-shirt here on Guess’ site.
LRA rebels kill two women in Southern Sudan
By Richard Ruati
October 15, 2009 (YAMBIO) — Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels have killed 2 women during last Wednesday raids near Yambio town in Western Equatoria State, an Arrow member have said.
Around 12 LRA fighters attacked the village across River Uze at about 11:00am (local time) on Wednesday, killing 2 civilians, said Richard Sovura Tambua, Coordinator of Arrow Boys, a local self defense group.
Four hours later the rebels launched a similar assault on the village of Nambia, where the second woman was killed and her body was mutilated by the LRA soldiers.
“They (Arrow Boys) killed three LRA soldiers there, among them a corporal. The LRA had attacked the civilians,” Tambua said.
Tambua added that, “they were with SPLA proper in the attack against LRA bandits.”
He appealed to the Government of Southern Sudan and WES to put an eye on their civilians, as without civilians there will no government.
Combating the small groups of guerrillas – experienced in jungle warfare and able to slip across international frontiers with apparent ease – has become a hard task for the joint military operations.
As purported LRA attacks destroy homes, churches and schools in Western Equatoria, civilians grab their possessions and flee.
A Uganda-led coalition including Congo and South Sudan launched a joint offensive against LRA strongholds in Congo’s isolated Garamba National Park on December 14 after LRA leader Joseph Kony again failed to sign a deal to end his rebellion.
However, despite early bombing raids on the bases and initial claims of success, the offensive has so far failed to locate Kony, a self-styled mystic whose rebels are notorious for kidnapping women and children and forcing children to fight.
Kony is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague for war crimes.
The Lord’s Resistance Army is no longer the Ugandan, Acholi-speaking rebel group it once was. Arabic and other languages are now accepted languages as the group forcibly recruits people from Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo and southern Sudan.
(ST)
Music we love: Mumford and Sons
Because of songs like “The Cave”, Mumford and Sons is easily becoming one of our favorite bands. They somehow have the ability to transport you to Woodstock. And isn’t it funny that somehow every one of our parents went?
As THE INDEPENDENT says:
West London’s latest folk movement has already been compared by some to the Laurel Canyon scene of the Sixties and early Seventies. The Thames Valley scene, if you like. But if Laura Marling’s fragile confessionals make her the Joni Mitchell, and Noah and the Whale are the soon-to-be over-exposed Eagles, then Mumford and Sons may be the slow-burning super-group, the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.
(Take a listen to the 2 aforementioned bands as well)
Prendergast talks fire in southern Sudan
Prendergast continues to be a big supporter of Invisible Children
Sudan’s state-sponsored pyromania
The Los Angeles Times
Opinion
By John Prendergast
October 19, 2009
The Khmer Rouge’s Pol Pot had hundreds of thousands of people dig their own mass graves before they were beaten to death in Cambodia’s killing fields. Rwanda’s Interahamwe militias used machetes to kill 800,000 people in 100 days. Now, another low-tech, clandestine approach to orchestrating mass atrocities is being perfected by the ruling National Congress Party, or NCP, in Sudan. No need for shovels or machetes when you have a box of matches.
Over the last two decades, I’ve gone to smoldering village after smoldering village in Sudan and the surrounding region, interviewing the survivors of attacks by militias supported by the NCP. Each time the pattern is the same.
(more…)
Obama rolls out new policy on Sudan, weaker than expected
IN SHIFT FOR OBAMA, U.S. SETTLES ON MODULATED POLICY FOR SUDAN
By Colum Lynch and Mary Beth Sheridan
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, October 17, 2009
After lengthy debate, the Obama administration has settled on a policy toward Sudan that offers a dramatically softer approach than the president had advocated on the campaign trail — but steers clear of the conciliatory tone advocated by his special envoy to the country.
The new U.S. policy, which will be formally unveiled Monday, calls for a campaign of “pressure and incentives” to cajole the government in Khartoum into pursuing peace in the troubled Darfur region, settling disputes with the autonomous government in southern Sudan and providing the United States greater cooperation in stemming international terrorism, according to administration officials briefed on the plan. It also provides Khartoum with a path to improved relations with the United States if it begins to address long-standing U.S. concerns.
The public rollout of the policy brings an end to months of contentious internal debate on how to confront a government headed by an indicted war crimes suspect, President Omar Hassan al-Bashir, and blamed in the deaths of more than 300,000 people in Darfur, according to U.N. estimates.
In what is intended as a show of unity for the new policy, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Susan E. Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, will announce it at the State Department with President Obama’s special envoy to Sudan, retired Air Force Maj. Gen. J. Scott Gration. Rice and Gration had battled fiercely over the direction of the new policy, with Rice pressing for a tougher line and Gration calling for easing U.S. sanctions.
In an interview last month with The Washington Post, Gration said he wanted to give “cookies” and “gold stars” to Khartoum, infuriating human rights advocates and congressional officials. Under the new policy, Gration will not be authorized to negotiate directly with Bashir, and Sudan will not be removed from the State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism in the immediate future, officials said.
The administration officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the policy ahead of Monday’s announcement.
The review also addresses a long-standing dispute between Rice, who has argued that there is an “ongoing genocide” in Darfur, and Gration over how to characterize the violence in Darfur. From now on, the United States will maintain that genocide “is taking place” in Darfur, officials said. The agreement on genocide represents a setback for Gration, who argued publicly in June that Sudan is no longer engaged in a campaign of mass murder in that region. “What we see is the remnants of genocide,” he told reporters.
But the administration’s policy also marks a significant evolution for the president and close aides such as Rice. During last year’s campaign, Obama and his top advisers had advocated a more confrontational approach to Sudan — including tougher sanctions and the establishment of a no-fly zone that would prevent Sudanese fighter jets from bombing Darfurian villages. “There must be real pressure placed on the Sudanese government,” Obama said last year. “We know from past experience that it will take a great deal to get them to do the right thing.”
Brand new, bigger than ever bookdrive with Better World Books (whew)
These are some of the books that get us jazzed here at Invisible Children. Read them. It’ll change your life. Yeah, even that last one.
Books have an amazing ability to do that. Which is why we love BetterWorldBooks.com so much. Last year’s book drive was such a success that we’re doing it again. That’s right. More books. More laughs (though completely unrelated). And more children in school in northern Uganda than have been since the war began, over twenty years ago. That’s what we’re shooting for this year, as we tweak our request for books by just a little bit.
It ain’t that difficult. You’ll catch on fast.
Together with our partner, Better World Books, Invisible Children is rewriting the book on development work through our Schools for Schools Book Drive. This year, the book drive is focusing on collecting high-quality, newer books that can be used to support programs like Schools for Schools. And the three schools that collect the most books will be awarded all-expenses-paid trips to northern Uganda to see their hard work pay off for the next generation.
To get started, follow these simple steps:
1. SELECT A BOOK DRIVE CAPTAIN
When you sign up for Schools for Schools, we’ll send you an invite for the book drive. Get that invite to your Captain ASAP so he or she can log on and get started.
2. PRINT BOOK DRIVE POSTERS
Spread word of your book drive far and wide by plastering your campus and community with book drive posters.
3. COLLECT BOOKS
Brainstorm creative ways to collect books from your community or your college campus. Talk to libraries, visit your campus bookstore, go door to door, set up a table at every football game. There’s plenty of books out there – it’s up to you to get ‘em!
4. PRESCREEN
This year the competition is going to be based on points, not the number of books you collect. When your captain logs in he or she can start prescreening books. Type in the ISBN number of each book to find out how many points it’s worth. Your points will update daily onto the Schools for Schools site so you can see how you’re doing in the competition. The three schools with the most points on January 29th will win a trip to Uganda.
5. SHIP YOUR BOOKS
As long as you prescreen, shipping will be on our dime, every time. We’ll hook your book drive captain up with UPS labels so you can ship books as you go.
Channel Profit for Peace
Tell your family and friends to buy their books online at betterworldbooks.com/invisiblechildren and help Invisible Children end Africa’s longest-running war. Invisible Children receives 10% of your book purchases. And if you buy a book donated through S4S, IC gets 60% of the cut.
About Better World Books
Better World Books is a for-profit social enterprise that collects used books and sells them online to raise money for literacy initiatives worldwide. They offer great bargains on used books – over 6 million used and new titles, with free shipping anywhere in the U.S. and just $3.97 worldwide. What’s more, you love cheap used books and so does the environment – when you buy used, you save books from landfill and conserve resources.
In the last round, the Schools for Schools book drive raised over 1.7 million books and dramatically exceeded its initial collection goal of 250,000 books. 220 schools participated in the book drive, including over 30 colleges and universities. The winning school in the competition was St. Xavier High School in Louisville, KY with over 30,000 books.
Change history. Donate a book. And help start a new chapter of peace for northern Uganda.
LIVE EARTH passed us a note. We’re going to the dance together.
LIVE EARTH's stellar concerts have brought caring for our planet into the international spotlight
Maybe you’ve heard of LIVE EARTH. They’re the ones that boast “Most Watched Online Entertainment Event Ever” status with their Live Earth Concerts – featuring artists like Madonna, Rihanna, Shakira, and more – all reaching out to shine the light on ol’ Mother Earth.
Anyway, they take environmental issues head-on with their events, and they’re big supporters of our efforts to provide safe drinking water to the kids in our Schools for Schools programs. We’re super stoked because Live Earth has asked us to partner with them, promoting awareness of the crisis in East Africa at their events. This is a huge opportunity, and we’re grateful for their help.
We talked to Earth. She said “What up.” Check out their site, LiveEarth.org. Worth your time.
DR Congo terror: video shows thousands fleeing LRA
Click HERE to watch the Telegraph’s video report.
The LRA specialises in abducting and murdering children and tens of thousands have fallen into its hands since it began its campaign in Northern Uganda two decades ago. The rebels have now been forced out of Uganda and into neighbouring Congo, where they have escalated a murderous campaign.
Medecins sans Frontières, the aid agency, said that hundreds of thousands of refugees had been displaced in two regions of north-eastern Congo. “The local population is the target of violence: murder, kidnapping and sexual abuse,” said Luis Encinas, the MSF coordinator in Central Africa. “We are talking about tactics of violence aimed at instilling fear in the people. Our patients have told us the most brutal stories about children who are forced to kill their parents and people burnt alive inside their homes.”
A sudden influx of refugees has tripled the populations of some towns. The urban centres of Gangala and Banda near Congo’s north-eastern frontier with Sudan are each hosting more than 20,000 displaced people.
The LRA’s leader, Joseph Kony, has been indicted for crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court. He is thought to be at large in Congo or the Central African Republic.
BBC News: LRA situation getting worse in Congo
The situation in northern Democratic Republic of Congo where Lord’s Resistance Army rebels operate is getting worse, a medical charity says.
Medecins Sans Frontieres told the BBC hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing renewed rebel attacks.
LRA leader Joseph Kony once operated from Uganda but his fighters now cover a vast area of central Africa.
Analysts says attempts this year by regional armed forces to halt the brutal campaign have so far failed.
The armies of Uganda, southern Sudan and DR Congo have been carrying out offensives against the rebels since Mr Kony refused to sign a peace deal late last year.
The rebels are infamous for carrying out mutilations and have kidnapped tens of thousands of children to be fighters and sex slaves.
Tens of thousands of people have also been made homeless during the LRA’s two-decade insurgency.
‘Living in fear’
MSF says roads in northern DR Congo are now so insecure that aircraft are being used to take supplies and staff to remote locations.
“The situation is really bad: the people are living in constant fear, they’re fleeing,” MSF’s Operational Director Meine Nicolai told the BBC’s Network Africa programme.
“The violence pops up in different areas and it’s really expanding. It came to Congo in 2008 and now it’s going more and more eastwards so the area is expanding and people live in constant fear.”
Ms Nicolai said civilians were being targeted.
BBC: Here’s the link
You guys, here is the link to todays BBC story on Invisible Children. (now it’s the full clip, even longer and more epic) We may be young, we may be unconventional, but the hard work of young activists across the world is getting attention. Send this link to all your teachers, pastors, friends and foes.
And a special thanks to Kim Ghattas at BBC. She caught the vision, and wouldn’t stop until this story made it to air. She is a hero.
you can copy this link:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/world_news_america/8300134.stm
Obama’s Peace Prize
NO PEACE, NO PRIZE
by Joe Klein
There is a slight whiff of condescension attending the announcement that Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize. There is the sense that he has won simply by not being George W. Bush. Effete Europe is congratulating rowdy America for cleaning up its act and not bringing guns to the dinner table.
Well, I’m as relieved as anybody that the Bushian gunslingers have been given the gate and, as regular readers know, I’m a big fan of patient, rigorous diplomacy–and there’s a certain lovely irony to any prize that brings the Taliban and the neoconservative Commentary crowd together in high dudgeon–but let’s face it: this prize is premature to the point of ridiculousness. It continues a pattern that holds some peril for Obama: he is celebrated for who he is not, and for who he might potentially be, rather than for what he has actually done. If he doesn’t provide results that justify the award, this Nobel will prove a millstone come election time.
And so, how to handle this “triumph” becomes a strategic puzzle that requires serious thought. Two immediate thoughts occur: he can’t reject it, but accepting it can’t be about him. He can and should immediately say something like, “I don’t deserve this.” That’s a no brainer. The question is, what should he say after that?
We’re on the BBC tonight!
A segment will air on BBC America tonight about our event in June called How It Ends. It will air during the World News America show, about half an hour in. Get the popcorn, get in your snuggie, and scoot close to the TV.
BBC America is carried by Cox in the San Diego area (that’s us here in the office) and the show airs at 4pm and 7pm PT. Hopefully lots of people will see it and be inspired by what young people are doing.
The Economist: Obama and Africa
November, 2008 -
IN AMERICA this has been a week for the drawing up of lists—lists of the virtues of Barack Obama, lists of big names for his administration, lists of big tasks for his bulging in-tray. But in Congo this week a million hungry and terrified refugees are in desperate need of food and protection. The two things are connected, in a way that may surprise, and dismay, Mr Obama’s admirers. If he is to prove worthy of the near-universal exaltation with which his election has been greeted, he has to prepare America and the world for the possibility of further American military interventions overseas.
This is not to say that it is America that has to provide the 3,000 extra peacekeeping troops the United Nations has asked for in Congo. The French have troops available, and America is in no mood for new entanglements. With an overstretched army and an economy on life support, most Americans reckon this is a time to rebuild at home, not embark on new adventures in far-flung places. Most foreigners probably agree. In their eyes, George Bush’s wars were a disaster, if not a crime. They think that whatever Mr Obama says about winning in Afghanistan, he was elected to practise war no more.
A lovely sentiment. The trouble is that history does not take a holiday just because America needs a breather. Mr Obama will sooner or later face a question that has plagued all recent presidents. Forget about wars launched in the name of defeating terrorism, stopping nuclear proliferation or pursuing some other direct American interest. What should the world’s strongest and (still) richest country do when famine or conflict strike places whose own governments will not or cannot help, where America has no direct interest, but where averting a humanitarian disaster may require military intervention?
(more…)
BBC News: Rebel terror spreads to CAR
For years a swath of the African continent has been a killing ground for the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). As the BBC’s Chris Simpson reports, villagers in southern parts of the Central African Republic are the latest to flee in fear from the rebels.
Like the rest of his village, Elie Leande, the chief of Kourokou I, is now living in a makeshift camp near Obo, the regional capital of Haut-Mbomou in southern CAR.
“Every day you hear of shots being fired and that means the Tongo Tongo are still in the area,” says Leande. He says the LRA attacked his village in May, killing 10 civilians. “I had not really heard of these people before, but now they are always with us,” he says. “I do not know what they want, because they attack you before you can talk to them.”
As with other locals, Mr Leande refers to the LRA as the Tongo Tongo.
‘No return’
The first reports of LRA activity in Haut-Mbomou filtered through in February 2008. The LRA originated in Uganda two decades ago, with leader Joseph Kony claiming he wanted to overthrow the Kampala government and install a Bible-based theocracy. Since then, the rebels have fought battles across several countries.
In Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo – and now the CAR – the LRA insurgency has been characterised by small groups of combatants attacking villages, burning property, taking hostages, raiding crops and livestock.
After a period of relative calm, LRA attacks resumed in May this year. Elie Leande lists the villages hit and then abandoned: “Diniri, Gassimbla, Koubou, Gougbere, Ngouli, Kouroukou… our government was very negligent.”
Local human rights organisations have complained bitterly of a lack of proper protection, calling on the government to step up the deployment of troops to the area. With the CAR’s approval, Uganda has deployed troops to take part in a major operation against the LRA.
The Guardian: Screening the Rescue in London
For more than 20 years the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has waged a brutal war against government troops in the north of Uganda, under the leadership of Joseph Kony. During that time thousands of children have been abducted from their villages and forced to fight for the rebel group.
Katine, the sub-county of north-east Uganda being supported by the Guardian, has not escaped Kony’s group. In 2003 the rebels attacked the area, causing many people to flee their homes for the safety of camps. Many returned to find their homes destroyed and their cattle stolen. The extraordinary story of a young man from Katine who was abducted by the LRA features on the Katine website.
On Tuesday October 13, the Guardian Christian Network will be screening a documentary from the young American filmmakers who made Invisible Children, a documentary exposing the plight of child soldiers in northern Uganda. This time round, in a film called The Rescue, they chart the often shocking history of the civil war in Uganda, from independence to the rise and rule of terror of Kony, and the current attempts to reach a peace settlement and a final end to the war.
After the screening and the presentation, there will be a Q&A with representatives from Invisible Children. There will also be a short presentation on the Katine project.
If you are interested in attending the screening of The Rescue at the Guardian’s offices in London send an email with your name to eliza.anyangwe@guardian.co.uk by Friday 9 October.
The event begins at 6pm. Seats will be available on a first come, first serve basis.