Blog Posts in Advocacy
One Million Bones Project
This guest post by Naomi Natale originally appeared on the Genocide Intervention Network blog.
As a 2010 Carl Wilkens Fellow, I am excited for the opportunity to introduce a new project to the anti-genocide community. I am thrilled to announce that on March 14, 2010, the One Million Bones project officially launched in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
One Million Bones is a fundraising art installation designed to recognize the millions of victims who have been killed or displaced by ongoing genocides, creating a visual demand for solutions to this issue. Our mission is to increase global awareness of these atrocities while raising the critical funds needed to protect and aid displaced and vulnerable victims.
The goal of One Million Bones is for one million people to each create one bone to represent one victim of genocide. In the spring of 2013, each bone will be installed on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Like a mass grave, the installation will recall the millions of victims of genocide, and demand action from the American people, our policy makers, and the worldwide community to end ongoing atrocities.
To raise funds, One Million Bones requests a sponsorship of $5 for each bone submitted in hopes of generating $5 million. Proceeds will be donated to our beneficiary organizations – Genocide Intervention Network, Enough, and Women for Women International.
To open the project up to a larger audience of people and to raise further funds, the project offers a second way to participate. This option will allow individuals who would like to be a part of the project but who cannot create a bone to make a $15 contribution that will enable a bone to be manufactured and sponsored in their name. These manufactured bones will be constructed of biodegradable materials impregnated with seeds. When the installation is completed, One Million Bones will distribute these bones to be buried with a foreseeable future of growth. That way this project will not end with the installation; rather, it will renew itself the following year. Hopefully, this regeneration will celebrate the end of one or more outbreaks of genocide; if not, it will reinvigorate the movement calling for an end to the atrocities.
The importance of this project within the anti-genocide movement lies in its mission to create a visual movement that is based on civic engagement and participation. One Million Bones offers an open, creative and educational environment in which students can address the issue of genocide. The project also offers an opportunity for individuals to find their voices in this movement, while creating a visual space where that voice will be heard and understood in a tangible way. But the most important component of this project is to use the momentum and participation to change the behavior of the international community regarding genocide.
I am excited for the opportunity to introduce this project to the anti-genocide community and to ask for your support. On behalf of the One Million Bones project, I invite all of you to be a part of it… to find your voice through your actions, your hands, your eyes, and your vision. For more information please visit our website at www.onemillionbones.org
Photo courtesy of One Million Bones
Technorati Tags: Congo Spotlighted in This Week’s Law & Order SVU
This week’s all-new episode of Law and Order: Special Victims Unit once again takes on an issue we at Enough are passionate about: ending the epidemic of violence against women in eastern Congo.
In the second half, the episode “Witness” highlights the searing story of a young Congolese woman who escaped the violence in eastern Congo and now lives in the United States. Although she is many thousands of miles away from her home, a turn of events forces her to confront her own experience with rape in Congo. Her story highlights the fact that the trade in conflict minerals from Congo is helping perpetuate the violence, and as consumers, we bear responsibility for helping to end the sordid trade so that Congo’s people can benefit from their country’s resource wealth.
In the gripping, highly fictionalized style that regular followers of SVU love, scriptwriters (with some input from Enough) incorporated this tragic and underreported theme into a story that will reach hundreds of thousands of viewers in the United States on Wednesday night. Please tune in at 10/9c. After watching this account of the character’s experience, learn about the work being done daily to empower the real women of Congo and reform the conflict minerals trade.
Please help spread the word about Wednesday night’s episode and the resources available that explain the real-life dimension of the tragedy unfolding right now in eastern Congo. On Twitter and Facebook, please post:
Law&Order #SVU this Wed takes on war over conflict minerals in #Congo. Learn about real-life drama: http://bit.ly/9zraNG
Standing Up Against Censorship
Today is World Day Against Cyber Censorship. In a world of anonymous commenting, pirated movies, and 4chan, some may ask, what is cyber censorship? It manifests itself in a variety of forms, and this week The New York Times and others highlighted the removal of certain censorships that prohibited technology companies from exporting their products and services to Sudan, Iran, and Cuba.
If you happened to catch the news stories, you would have seen this couched as the "lifting of certain sanctions" against these countries. The removal of such sanctions ostensibly allowed tech companies like Microsoft, Yahoo, and Twitter to begin offering locally customized versions of their services in these markets.
It would be logical to assume then that a person going online in one of these countries would have previously been unable to access Hotmail or send their latest Tweet off into the cloud. However, this is not actually the case and that should come as no surprise to anyone who recalls the State Department asking Twitter to delay scheduled maintenance last summer during the Iranian election. The nature of the internet is such that if an online product is publicly available on the web, anyone can access it from any location. That is, as long as their government or internet service provider does not censor the content, in the more palpable form of "cyber censorship" that many of us initially conjure up when we hear the term.
On World Day Against Cyber Censorship, it's important for us to see beyond these more obvious forms of cyber censorship and also examine subtler manifestations that are evidenced in such moves by the U.S. government. By previously barring consumer web companies from customizing their already accessible online products for these regions, the U.S. government was implicitly depriving these citizens of the means of expression that could prove so valuable. While the Obama administration has now realized the national security gains to be had from relaxing certain censorship, we should not forget that this happened only after these tools had been mainstream for years and could have been more effectively used in a variety of conflict zones had they been tailored to the local region when it mattered.
This reality is only more heartbreaking on the eve of the highly controversial Sudanese election. With less than a month before polling begins, it's unlikely that these platforms and services will be optimized for the small percentage of Sudanese civilians that could actually make use of them. Because of the quiet American cyber-censorship that has existed for years, activists and civil society members in Sudan will not have access to highly developed and optimized tools that could aid their efforts to form an effective democracy.
On World Day Against Cyber Censorship, let's call for an end to the notion that any government, for any reason, can or should restrict the right of global citizens to communicate and access information. For whatever reason, to whatever end, access to communication tools are a fundamental human right.
Senate Passes LRA Bill, As LRA Finds Safe Haven in Sudan
The Senate bill aimed at devising a strategy for stopping the brutal, 24-year insurgency by the Lord’s Resistance Army passed last night with a record 65 co-sponsors. After weeks of uncertainty when Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn (R) put a hold on the bill, the victory for anti-LRA activists – a contingent of whom camped out in front of Coburn’s office for 11 days – is particularly poignant.
In a statement issued by lead co-sponsors and longtime champions on the LRA issue, Senators Feingold (D-WI), Brownback (R-KS), and Inhofe (R-OK) noted the delay in passing the bill but were enthusiastic about the outcome. Feingold said:
“The passage of this bill sends a message that the United States will no longer stand by and watch the Lord’s Resistance Army terrorize innocent civilians across central Africa, kidnap thousands of children and force them to become child soldiers. This legislation also sends a clear signal that the United States is committed to working with regional stakeholders to change the conditions that have allowed this war to persist for so long."
Brownback expressed his gratitude to Senate colleagues for appreciating the importance and urgency of the bill, and Inhofe called last night’s affirmative vote a “victory for the countless lives destroyed at the hands of [LRA leader] Joseph Kony.”
But even as Enough, along with advocacy partners Resolve Uganda and Invisible Children, celebrate this progress in Congress, new alarming reports have emerged that a dangerous contingent of the LRA has made its way to Darfur. Based on field research and analysis, Enough confirmed today that a group of LRA fighters have found safe haven in areas of Darfur controlled by the Sudanese government. This development – signaling renewed collusion between Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and LRA leader Joseph Kony, both wanted war criminals – demands investigation by U.S. policymakers and the international community.
Enough Co-founder John Prendergast reacted to the news in a press release issued this morning:
"The Khartoum regime's principal tool of war during its 21-year reign has been support for marauding militias such as the Janjaweed, the Murahaliin, and the Lord's Resistance Army," said Enough Co-founder John Prendergast. “Facing no consequences for this destructive method of governing, it is unsurprising that the regime is again providing safe haven for the LRA. Absent a cost for this, we will likely see the LRA unleashed again later this year to destabilize the referendum in southern Sudan."
Amid news of the passage of the Senate LRA bill and revelations about the insurgency spreading to Darfur, Enough’s LRA researcher Ledio Cakaj published his latest report documenting abuses by both the LRA and the Congolese army on civilians in northeastern Congo. It’s a damning look at how civilians bear the brunt of the violence from both sides, while the U.N. mission remains relatively futile when it comes to protecting civilians. The report is a sobering reminder of what’s likely in store for the already traumatized people of Darfur as the LRA continues its march north. It is also a compelling case for why last night’s passage of the Senate LRA bill couldn’t have come soon enough. Now we must focus attention on pushing the companion bill through the House.
Worth Doing Darfur Right
An interesting piece on Bloomberg today featured U.S. Special Envoy for Sudan Scott Gration discussing the ongoing Darfur peace talks in the context of upcoming national elections scheduled for April. As Gration put it, “We have this little window where we really need to get the framework solidified,” said Gration.
Gration is correct that the national election will demand a great deal of time and attention from both the international community and the Sudanese government, and that there are “going to be a lot of things that are keeping us from focusing on Darfur.” Key international actors will also be increasingly eager to put Darfur on a back burner as we get closer to the independence referendum for South Sudan in January 2011.
Yet previous attempts to reach a peace deal for Darfur suggest that the most important thing is to strike a comprehensive peace agreement that can be practically implemented and effectively monitored. This remains a far more important over-arching goal than trying to shoe horn in an agreement before the April election or trying to throw a quick deal together that will not stand the test of time. A lasting peace for Darfur involves lots of complicated issues: refugee and displaced returns, compensation for victims; accountability, what to do with rebel weapons and government militias, power-sharing, and more. It is important to remember that at the end of the day, elections are part of the peace process – not the other way around.
We hope to have some more insights into the ongoing talks between the government of Sudan and the Justice and Equality Movement in the next several days, so stay tuned.
