The International Committee of the Red Cross warned Wednesday that thousands of Syrian civilians besieged by government and rebel forces alike were in desperate need of aid. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
The Red Cross said Tuesday it will shut down three of its 17 offices in Afghanistan, two months after an unprecedented militant attack on the organisation. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
A delegation from the Panamanian Red Cross Tuesday visited the 35 crew members from a North Korea ship being held for carrying undeclared Cuban weapons. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
An Israeli court said Sunday it has jailed for 30 months two senior Hamas members who took refuge inside Red Cross east Jerusalem offices for a year and a half.
The Jerusalem district court issued the sentence as part of a plea bargain in which former Palestinian minister for Jerusalem affairs Khaled Abu Arafeh and Hamas MP Mohammed Totah admitted to “membership of a terror organisation” and staying in Israel without permits.
The two had barricaded themselves inside the offices of the International Committee of the Red Cross on July 1, 2010 and were arrested on January 23, 2012.
The ICRC compound is in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood of occupied east Jerusalem.
According to police, the two men both had their Israeli identity cards revoked 18 months before their arrest, meaning they were not legally entitled to be in the city.
The 30-month jail sentences were issued on Thursday, but the court only distributed news of the decision to the media on Sunday.
Hamas has 74 members in the 132-seat Palestinian Authority Legislative Council, which is based in Ramallah. Twelve of them are now being held by Israel, including Totah.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Spain’s Pamplona bull-running fiesta wrapped up on Sunday with another five seriously injured, including an Australian woman who was gored, after nine days that landed a total of 50 daredevils in hospital.
Nearly half of those were seriously hurt on Saturday when the run in the northern Spanish town resulted in a bloody human pile-up that got trampled by the half-tonne bulls, sending 23 revellers to hospital.
As on each of the last eight mornings, a firework set off Sunday’s mad dash through Pamplona’s cobbled streets of six bulls and six steers as well as hundreds of thrill-seekers, many dressed in traditional white with a red neckerchief.
The animals will be killed by matadors in the final bullfight of the nine-day San Fermin festival.
The early morning bull runs are the highlight of the fiesta, which was immortalised in Ernest Hemingway’s classic 1926 novel “The Sun Also Rises” and now draws hundreds of thousands of tourists each year.
The regional government said five runners were hospitalised on Sunday including a 23-year-old Australian woman with a gore wound.
During Friday’s run, bulls gored three men including a 20-year-old American.
Each year, hundreds of people are treated by medics and the Red Cross at the scene for cuts and scrapes without being hospitalised.
Fifteen people have been killed in the bull runs since records began in 1911. The most recent death was four years ago when a bull gored a 27-year-old Spaniard in the neck, heart and lungs.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
More than 55,000 refugees from eastern Democratic Republic of Congo have arrived in Uganda after fleeing a rebel attack, Red Cross officials said on Sunday, a dramatic rise from earlier estimates.
“Given such numbers there is need for urgent humanitarian assistance, as some of the refugees are sick and have left all their belongings in Congo,” Uganda Red Cross official Catherine Ntabadde told AFP.
Tallies made late Saturday estimated 55,000 refugees had crossed the border, up from 30,000 the day before, she added.
Refugees have streamed across the border into western Uganda’s Bundibugyo district since the attack on Thursday, although the numbers of new arrivals crossing on Sunday had slowed to a trickle.
“Many new arrivals are also reported to be staying in the community,” United Nations refugee agency official Karen Ringuette said. “New arrivals are staying at five primary schools and various other sites.”
Thousands crowded into the grounds of schools in Bundibugyo — about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the border with Congo — offered as a temporary shelter, with many building makeshift shelters or simply sleeping out in the open.
The Red Cross are working with the United Nations and other aid agencies to set up a camp further inside Uganda, although many refugees appeared reluctant to leave.
“The (Ugandan)government has found a transit camp eight kilometres (five miles) from Bundibugyo town … There we can start registering them afresh,” Ntabadde said.
However, an AFP photographer said that long lines of refugees crossing into Uganda seen in recent days had declined, and that large crowds were waiting to return back into DR Congo.
Ugandan police however were encouraging people to move to the new camp, refugees said.
The town of Kamango in the northernmost part of DR Congo’s North Kivu province was attacked and briefly occupied Thursday by a Ugandan-led rebel group, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).
Residents of Kamango said that public buildings and the hospital had been pillaged but no toll was given of possible casualties.
In Bundibugyo, refugees carried their belongings piled on their heads, including rolled-up mattresses, cooking pots and chickens.
Some refugees complained that while they had seen food delivered by the UN World Food Programme, they had not yet received any.
“We have nothing to eat, because when we ran from the rebels we could only grab what we had around us and could carry,” said Teresa Zaki, who fled from Kamango on Thursday.
The ADF was formed in the mid-1990s in the Rwenzori mountains in western Uganda, close to the DR Congo border.
Part of the ADF is now based in DR Congo after Ugandan government forces attacked their bases two years ago.
It has been relatively quiet in recent years, and it was not immediately clear what sparked the ADF attack on Kamango.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Daredevil bull-runners were crushed in a pile-up in the Spanish city of Pamplona on Saturday during its famed San Fermin festival, with at least 21 people hospitalised, officials said.
Television pictures showed a pile of runners, in traditional white shirts and red neckerchiefs, blocking the entrance to a bullring, the end point of the frantic dash through the town’s cobbled streets.
The pile-up blocked several of the animals from charging into the arena, with panicked runners scrambling over the heads of those in front of them and others trying to pull the fallen free.
Two of the beasts — of the six bulls and the six steers that ran — leapt over the pile, crushing runners under their hooves. The others were herded to the arena through a side passage.
Several people were also trampled under the bulls’ hooves during the crowded 850-metre (930-yard) dash through the city’s narrow streets, which took four minutes and 15 seconds.
It was the sixth day of the fiesta in this northern town, which draws festival-goers and daredevils from around the world for a week of drinking and perilous bull-runs.
Javier Sesma, a doctor from the emergency unit of the local Navarra Hospital, told reporters that 21 people were injured in the run and the pile-up overall.
These included a 19-year-old man from the Spanish town of Vitoria who was in serious condition with a chest injury, and an Irish man with a less severe injury, also to his chest.
The 19-year-old was “in an especially serious condition with a chest trauma causing breathing problems, and is requiring breathing apparatus,” Sesma said. “He is in a stable but serious condition.”
He added that a further two people were being treated for gore wounds.
Spanish media said it was the worst stampede in decades at the festival.
Live television pictures showed one man being carried away unconscious, his face bleeding.
The chaotic run nearly doubled the overall toll of those hospitalised in the previous six days of runs. The toll published by the Navarre region authorities had stood at 22 before Saturday’s charge.
Each year, hundreds of other people are treated by medics and the Red Cross at the scene for light injuries without being hospitalised.
Saturday’s run involved bulls from the Fuente Ymbron ranch in Cadiz.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Authorities in the Bahamas say they have intercepted a rickety boat carrying 30 Haitian migrants, including five children.
The Royal Bahamas Defense Force says it is transporting the migrants to the capital of Nassau, where they will be met by immigration officials and Red Cross volunteers. They will eventually be sent back to Haiti.
Military spokesman Origin Deleveaux says the sloop carrying five youngsters, one woman and 24 men was stopped early Sunday off Exuma Cays in the central Bahamas.
Haitian migrants have been coming to the Bahamas for years, fleeing severe poverty. They mostly try to reach the U.S., though some remain in the Bahamas to form a low-income workforce. While no official statistics exist, there are thought to be thousands of Haitians living in shantytowns on the islands.
From: http://feeds.foxnews.com/~r/foxnews/world/~3/ZWAgCNDLmLI/
The International Committee of the Red Cross is warning that the security situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating because warm spring weather has led to a surge in violence.
Gherardo Pontrandolfi, head of the ICRC delegation in Kabul, also appealed on the warring parties to respect civilians caught up in the fighting. Pontrandolfi spoke on Thursday.
So far, April has been the deadliest month this year. According to an Associated Press tally, 186 people — including civilians, security forces and foreign troops — have been killed in violence around the nation. Additionally, more than 150 insurgents have also died, according to the tally.
From: http://feeds.foxnews.com/~r/foxnews/world/~3/Ae2JduQ1aHQ/
By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation Launches DisasterReady.org
Free online training resource to improve disaster preparedness and response
SANTA MONICA, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– The Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation, a non-profit organization formed by global cloud-based talent management leader Cornerstone OnDemand (NAS: CSOD) , announced today the introduction of DisasterReady.org (www.disasterready.org), an online training resource that assists relief workers in disaster readiness and response.
The free, easy-to-use online resource is designed to improve the preparedness and effectiveness of relief workers around the world by providing access to affordable, high-quality training tools and support. DisasterReady.org enables every user to choose from a growing library of interactive e-learning courses created by experts in staff development and humanitarian assistance. In addition to e-learning courses, users can access relevant links, webinars and other resources to help prepare them for the rigors of aid work.
DisasterReady.org is a collaborative, non-profit effort supported by the Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation and prominent aid agencies, including some of the world’s foremost organizations, such as Save the Children, Mercy Corps, the International Rescue Committee, UNHCR, InsideNGO, Oxfam America, International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, and Project HOPE, among others.
“We created DisasterReady.org to help organizations worldwide better train and prepare their staff for the many challenges they will face in the field as they respond to disasters. Unfortunately, disasters have become both more frequent and more severe. In 2012 alone, there were 310 disasters that killed more than 9,300 people and affected 106 million others, at a total financial cost of $138 billion.1 Our DisasterReady.org initiative provides aid organizations with a means to better engage, prepare and educate their teams while improving the effectiveness of their efforts,” explained Julie Brandt, executive director of the Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation.
Adam Miller, founder and CEO of Cornerstone OnDemand, added, “We established the Cornerstone OnDemand Foundation to help build the capacity of the nonprofit sector with a particular focus on education, workforce development and disaster relief. As a leader in cloud-based human capital management solutions that enhance, empower and motivate workforces, we have leveraged our software, as well as our learning and development expertise, on behalf of the Foundation, helping to empower communities across the globe. DisasterReady.org allows the Foundation to extend its work in the disaster relief space and help ensure workers are properly educated, trained and prepared.”
“DisasterReady.org is a powerful professional development tool that enables aid workers
From: http://www.dailyfinance.com/2013/04/18/cornerstone-ondemand-foundation-launches-disasterr/
Local Red Cross officials in the capital of Central African Republic say at least 17 people are dead after fighting between rebels and residents.
The violence comes three weeks after fighters from the rebel alliance known as Seleka invaded the capital and overthrew President Francois Bozize.
Bozize, who had ruled for a decade, had himself come to power through a rebellion.
Residents of Bangui said they awoke Sunday to heavy gunfire rattling across the capital.
The weekend fighting left at least 10 people dead in the Poukandja neighborhood, while another seven bodies were found elsewhere.
The country’s new leader Michel Djotodia has begun the process of putting together a new government, though critics say he lacks control over the rebels in the streets who are accused of looting and violence.
From: http://feeds.foxnews.com/~r/foxnews/world/~3/T6gxFKmS4ww/
By The Huffington Post News Editors
BEIRUT, April 4 (Reuters) – The humanitarian situation in Syria is worsening rapidly with some areas a landscape of “devastation and destruction”, the Red Cross said on Thursday after a month which activists said was the bloodiest yet in the conflict.
About 70,000 people have been killed and millions displaced during the two-year-old uprising, the United Nations says. Civilians have been cut off from water, electricity and life-saving medical supplies, especially in rebel-held areas targeted by air strikes and ballistic missiles.
The Syrian government‘s restrictions on aid convoys have meant most supplies are distributed in government-held areas.
Peter Maurer, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), said aid workers had been able to do make more trips into opposition-held areas in the past two weeks, indicating Damascus may be softening its stance on convoys into such territory.
He said the workers were “not pleasantly surprised” by what they found in areas accessible for the first time, with the need for food, sanitation, water and medicine increasing.
“We saw devastation and destruction,” he said.
“What we were able to achieve is not enough. The needs are growing exponentially while our ability to react is growing linearly,” he said.
Convoys and volunteers for the Syrian Arab Red Crescent – the ICRC‘s partner in Syria – have been targeted during the civil war by both sides, who are suspicious of the group’s neutrality. Several volunteers have been jailed or killed.
Maurer called for aid groups to be respected. “When we have a convoy on the road from Damascus to any part of Syria it is of the uttermost importance that this convoy is allowed to pass checkpoints and is not shot at,” he said at the end of a three-day visit to neighbouring Lebanon, which has 400,000 Syrian refugees.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Monday that March was the bloodiest month yet in the conflict, with more than 6,000 people killed, a third of them civilians. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Huffington Post
By Matt Cantor 
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Newser – Home
A growing hunger strike among Guantanamo Bay detainees has sparked concern within the Red Cross, who is sending a doctor to the facility to address the “tensions.”
Pentagon spokesman Maj Jeff Pool told the BBC that 31 of 166 detainees at the facility in Cuba are now on a hunger strike, up from 21 last week.
Human rights groups and the prisoners’ lawyers say the strike — which began weeks ago — is occurring because detainees are feeling uncertain about their future.
“We see a clear link between that and their emotional state,” added Simon Schorno, spokesman of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
On Wednesday, White House Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that President Barack Obama‘s team is closely monitoring the hunger strike and remain committed to closing Guantanamo Bay.
By The Huffington Post News Editors
* 31 detainees participating in hunger strike
* After 11 years in captivity, their future is uncertain
* Efforts to close the camp have stalled
By Jane Sutton
MIAMI, March 26 (Reuters) – The International Committee of the Red Cross sent a doctor and another delegate to the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo a week earlier than planned because of concern about a growing hunger strike among detainees, an ICRC spokesman said on Tuesday.
About a dozen ICRC representatives were scheduled to make a regular two-week visit to the detention camp on April 1, ICRC spokesman Simon Schorno said.
“Because of the current tensions and hunger strike we decided to send a couple of delegates to the island starting this week,” Schorno said. “One is a medical doctor whose job is to follow more specifically the hunger strike.”
Thirty-one of the 166 prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base in Cuba have joined the hunger strike, said Navy Captain Robert Durand, a spokesman for the detention operation.
Eleven of them had lost enough weight that they were being fed liquid meals through tubes inserted into their noses and down into their stomachs, and three of those were hospitalized for rehydration and observation, Durand said.
The numbers had risen from 24 hunger strikers, with eight being force-fed a week ago.
Hunger strikes have flared up at the prison camp since it opened in January 2002 to hold men captured in counter-terrorism operations after the Sept. 11 attacks.
The current hunger strike began about seven weeks ago. Military officers, human rights monitors and lawyers representing the prisoners have said it reflects frustration at the failure to resolve their fate.
“Tensions at Guantanamo are certainly related, in our view, to the uncertainty that’s prevailing on the future for the detainees …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Huffington Post
North Korea says it’s cutting off a key military hotline with South Korea that allows cross border travel to a jointly run industrial complex in the North.
The move was announced in a statement sent Wednesday to South Korea from North Korea‘s chief delegate to inter-Korean military talks.
North Korea recently cut a Red Cross hotline between the Koreas, but there’s still a hotline linking aviation authorities in both Koreas.
The hotline mentioned Wednesday is important because the Koreas use it to communicate as hundreds of workers travel back and forth to the Kaesong industrial complex. Officials say more than 900 South Korean workers were in Kaesong on Wednesday.
North Korea is angry over routine U.S.-South Korean drills and recent U.N. sanctions punishing it for its Feb. 12 nuclear test.
A Yemeni security official says an employee of the International Committee of the Red Cross was wounded when gunmen opened fire at her car in the country’s capital, Sanaa.
ICRC spokeswoman Dibeh Fakhr in Geneva confirmed a “security incident” on Tuesday in Yemen that left an employee “slightly injured” but declined to give further details.
The Yemeni official says the female staffer was driving her can when gunmen shot at her. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The woman’s nationality was not immediately known.
Sanaa has seen several assassination attempts targeting government officials and opposition figures as well as attacks on diplomats and foreigners in the political turmoil following the uprising that ousted Yemen‘s long-time ruler Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The International Committee of the Red Cross says more than 60 people have been wounded in fighting between South Sudan‘s army and a rebel group.
The international Red Cross says 62 people have been taken to one of their medical facilities in the last two weeks.
South Sudan‘s army has been battling rebels led by David Yau Yau. South Sudan accuses Sudan of supporting the rebels. Khartoum denies the allegations.
The international Red Cross‘s Ewan Watson said Monday that the group is seeing “fairly serious injuries” caused mostly by light weapons.
The number of deaths is not known because the area is not accessible by outside groups. The military and government did not immediately have casualty information.
Watson said many more people might be wounded that authorities don’t know about.
By Rob Quinn 
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Newser – Home
By Brendan Byrnes, The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
In the video below, Ken Stern, former CEO of National Public Radio, discusses the current state of the charitable sector and gives his take on how companies can make a difference when giving to charities, namely by giving to the less sexy, but necessary, aspects of charity like infrastructure development.
The full version of the interview can be found here, in which Stern discusses his new book, With Charity For All. In the book, Stern takes on the charitable sector, which he says, “operates with little accountability, no real barriers to entry, and a stunning lack of evidence of effectiveness.” Stern discusses in detail what’s broken in the charitable sector, how to fix it, and how Americans can best make a difference. Given Stern‘s unique perspective from his time at NPR, we also discussed with him the future of radio and the technologies that are disrupting it.
If you’re looking for a great investing idea, The Motley Fool’s chief investment officer has selected his No. 1 stock for the next year. Find out which stock it is in the brand-new free report: “The Motley Fool’s Top Stock for 2013.” Just click here to access the report and find out the name of this under-the-radar company.
Brendan: These companies — we mentioned Wal-Mart, Goldman Sachs, ExxonMobil (the top three donors in 2011 according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy) — are they doing the kind of due diligence that individuals do not do, or do you find that they’re throwing their money into all sorts of charities in much the same way?
Ken: It’s actually a mixed story, with respect to corporations. I think companies tend to do a little bit better in terms of due diligence and effectiveness investigation or research than individuals do. It’s interesting to see that people who are employees of companies actually do more due diligence in their corporate role than they do in their own individual role.
One example I know of that is with the American Red Cross. One of the challenges of the American Red Cross, one of the signature charities this country has, is that people are unwilling to invest in infrastructure, and they’re really an infrastructure company. They’re a supply line company.
Think of the other supply line companies — FedEx, Wal-Mart, the United States Military — put billions into that infrastructure. No one wants to give the Red Cross money for that. When a tragedy occurs, they want to get money to the victims but they don’t ever invest for the next victim down the road — but companies do.
The American Red Cross has actually been somewhat effective in getting companies to help them invest in infrastructure and help them prepare for the next disaster. Only companies, not individuals, because I think companies think a little bit differently than individuals do.
The article One Area Where Companies Can Make a Difference originally appeared on Fool.com.
