A personal plea: Help me help someone save 'home' for millions

Hello.

I hope you don't mind me reaching out to you like this - I don't do it often, so when I do you know I mean it. I'm writing to ask you to help me make something amazing happen - in about four clicks and two minutes. If I had you at 'hello', then go here: http://bit.ly/voteSMS and vote for FrontlineSMS:Legal, as soon as possible. The site will ask you to enter your e-mail, but that's the only registration required.

If you feel, quite reasonably, that you'd like to know what you're clicking for, then read on...

Each of us interacts with the law all the time - it's a necessary, occasionally painful part of life, something we often have to deal with at the most difficult moments. Yet it's the bedrock on which our societies function, a critical check on power and a means of safe-guarding our rights and resources at every stage of life. Without access to the law, shocks can become crises; assets can disappear overnight; and constitutional rights can be overruled by social norms at the expense of the vulnerable in the community. For so many in the developing world access to justice is next to impossible, thanks to poor infrastructure and stifling bureaucracy.

FrontlineSMS:Legal is a fantastic organisation, setting out to do something completely new, at the boundary of two complex fields - using SMS to extend, improve and coordinate the systems and services that provide justice, and legal services, to hard-to-reach populations who are otherwise unable to access them. Mobile services are proven to improve systems and streamline data management, cost-effectively. I urge you to read more about their mission on their blog. You all know I'm a geek about this stuff - but this is quite literally the sexiest thing to happen to the law in developing countries, like, EVER. I get overcome with excitement just to be allowed to stand next to this project in public and occasionally make it cups of tea. Imagine my happiness to be able to actually help it along - with a few clicks and some light typing. And here's how:

FrontlineSMS:Legal is a semi-finalist in the Ashoka Changemakers competition on Property Rights - the page describing their entry is here. Of 211 applications submitted from 47 countries, they've made it to a round of 19. This round is a popular vote, open to every person/e-mail address interested in taking the time to register. The top 8 or 9 entries will be reviewed by a great panel of judges, including people like Hernando de Soto. Of those 8 or 9, they'll select 3 entries to win $50,000 each. Winning this competition could set FrontlineSMS:Legal on its feet and allow them to develop technology that will enable text messages to feed land registry maps, both on and offline - transforming the accountability of government in this area, one of the most prone to corruption and graft - and protecting the rights of land owners, so that when the unthinkable happens, the one thing people don't lose is home.

I think it's an amazing organisation and a great project, with the potential to make an immeasurable difference. Please please please, click on this link: http://bit.ly/voteSMS and vote for FrontlineSMS:Legal, as soon as possible. The site will ask you to enter your e-mail, but that's the only registration required. Click on the 'like' button or leave a comment and let the world know you were there!

Guys, I'm grateful to you for reading this far. Now go and vote. Let me know you have, and I promise I will make YOU the hot beverage of your choice with my own little hands.

And if I've really sold it to you and you've looked at the links and you believe in it too, then pass it on - tweet, email, Facebook, whatever - get people to click and vote, and we'll make something AWESOME happen.

Happy weekends, and thank you for reading!

Laura

Academic paywalls, and mobile technology in conflict-affected states - there's more than you think

I'm blogging from the World Bank's Innovation Fair: Moving Beyond Conflict in Cape Town, South Africa. In presenting a bit about FrontlineSMS and some thoughts on SMS in conflict, I referenced an article from Development In Practice, 'Challenging conventional views on mobile-telecommunications investment: evidence from conflict zones' (Agnieszka Konkel & Richard Heek Volume 19, Issue 3 May 2009, pages 414 - 420). Lots of thoughtful nods when I was talking, so I thought I'd put up a link and some of the findings.

The paper argues that the accepted pillars of a good 'investment climate' - 'security and stability, finance and infrastructure, workers and labour markets, and the regulatory framework and tax' - underpinned by 'good, stable governance' may not, in fact, be prerequisites for investment in mobile telephony. Afghanistan, DRC and Somalia, three countries with poor governance indicators, all show rapid mobile penetration growth rates between 2001 and 2006. Tentatively, they conclude that these figures are due to foreign investment, and possibly to individuals prioritising mobiles over other needs:

'...insecure countries are places of great uncertainty, and uncertainty pushes up the value of information. Thus citizens will be willing to invest a greater than average level of their income on information and communication technologies, particularly those – like mobile phones – which can help to provide just the kind of information (safe/unsafe locations, approaching dangers, places to find scarce commodities, etc.) that addresses their main uncertainties.'

Interesting implications for using mobiles and other information-sharing tools in conflict - and certainly fertile ground for future research. If you can get a copy of this short and useful article, it's well worth a read.

A Short Rant

A perennial complaint of mine is that so much excellent analysis and thinking - from conceptual thinking that could change our whole approach to aid and development, to deeply practical hazard prediction and mapping - is locked up in academic prose and, fatally, behind paywalls. David Steven on Global Dashboard wrote about this recently. Academic journals perform a vital function, but the ridiculous costs make the articles in them absolutely inaccessible to many in NGOs. The result: good work going to waste, and work on the ground and in offices in capitals all over the world not benefitting from the combined wisdom of the world's academics. Some examples of great free-to-air content:

• the Humanitarian Policy Group at the Overseas Development Institute
• the International Review of the Red Cross
• the Public Library of Science - PLoS.org (thanks to @EvieBrowne for the link).

Any more for any more?

SCHR: Updated position paper on civil-military relations

SCHR have revised and updated their position paper on Civil Military relations, first written in 2001 and updated in 2004, and have produced a very readable survey of the state of the debate. The paper:

'...looks primarily at how SCHR agencies consider relations with armed forces in situations of armed conflict, or natural disasters taking place in contested environments. This paper contributes to the current debate on humanitarian-military relations and fosters a better understanding of the respective roles and the necessity for humanitarian actors to commit to the positions elaborated herein. It is intended to inform and guide the internal policies and practical guidance of SCHR agencies.'

Read more on Reliefweb.

Sierra Leone supplies security contractors to Iraq

A report that a British PSC is employing ex-combatants from Sierra Leone in Iraq on a salary of $250 a month plus free training, room and board - just under ten times what they would earn at home but a fraction of the salary a Western security worker can command in Iraq, which can be in the region of $100k.

UPDATED: Shrinking costs of war?

UPDATE 26.01.10: Change.org's Daniel Gerstle looks at the sampling methods behind the statistics.

Quite a lot of discussion of the new Human Security Report [links to pdf], which revises down some of the estimated numbers killed in conflicts such as the civil war in the Congo and argues that actually, conflict is less deadly than it used to be. The International Rescue Committee disagrees, and Bill Schabas thinks it's all very interesting. Reuters explains why the numbers matter.

Meanwhile, Reuters also reports on a Lancet article (no, not that one) suggesting that 80% of the 300,000 conflict-related deaths in Darfur since 2003 were caused by disease.

ICG: Why the media prefer natural disasters

The British Red Cross supports its partners within the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement to respond to humanitarian emergencies around the world. These range from giving money, people and materials to respond to natural disasters, to supporting large scale humanitarian operations in conflict zones. Since 2006 the British Red Cross has had a dedicated team working to support the Movement in assisting people suffering from the effects of armed conflict. As an impartial and neutral organisation, the Red Cross seeks to help those who are in crisis, whoever and wherever they are.

Unfortunately, public appeals launched by British Red Cross for emergencies in conflict zones routinely raise far less funds than those appeals which are launched for natural "quick-onset" disasters. A recent example of this is the ongoing crisis in northern Pakistan, where it has been estimated that the millions who had to flee their homes due to fighting in 2008/09 has been the largest displacement of people since Partition. The needs were huge and British Red Cross launched an emergency appeal in 2009 to raise funds for the displaced. This appeal raised only £60,000 and, despite the efforts of our communications team, very little of our material regarding the humanitarian crisis was picked up by the news agencies.

In the following article, Andrew Stroehlein, Communications Director for the International Crisis Group examines why the media chooses to focus more on victims of natural disasters rather than on those caught up in armed conflict.

"If only Sri Lanka last year could have got a tenth of the media attention Haiti's now getting", lamented my friend who was working in Colombo at the time, "the public pressure might have saved so many lives." While no one would ever argue with the amount of press Haiti is deservedly receiving right now, it's easy to see his point. The international media respond very differently to the victims of natural disasters and the victims of wars.

Last year's brutal end to the long-running conflict in Sri Lanka produced tens of thousands of innocent dead and injured in its final few months, as government forces shelled areas with trapped civilians, and Tamil Tiger rebels prevented them from fleeing. Hundreds of thousands of survivors were then put into appalling government-run internment camps, from which they were not allowed to leave. This all garnered significant media attention at the very end of the fighting, but it never at any point had anything near the scale of media interest Haiti's earthquake is getting today.

Read more on Alertnet.

Change.org: Climate Change and Conflict

A few weeks back there was a world wide Climate Change Blog Action Day, organised by Change.org. Here are a few links that Change.org's Humanitarian Relief blogger Michael Bear gathered together, all relating to the causal impact of climate change on conflict:

• Conflict in the Age of Climate Change (from the Stop Genocide blog)
• A brief history of climate change and conflict (from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists)
• Climate change and Conflict (International Crisis Group)
• a map of countries most at risk from violence resulting from climate change (International Alert)

Michael notes:

[T]he issue isn't one of surviving an especially fierce rain or harsh winter, but the cumulative effects of many fierce rains and many harsh winters. Next, climate change alone won't cause conflict but, along with other factors, will contribute to and shape it. It's one variable among many others, such as cultural, economic, or demographic factors. Last, unless a society learns to adapt to sustained climate change, its wealth will decline and its social fabric will weaken with each passing year. But even if a society faces these environmental challenges, a trigger--such as an assassination, extreme natural event, or random act of group violence--is usually required to ignite violent conflict.

Typologies of conflict and categories of civilians

Two recent publications caught our eye:

• The International Review of the Red Cross publishes an issue focussing on the legal classification of armed conflict, increasingly vital in the growing number complex contexts in which the Movement works which do not fit the classic definitions of war between state actors
• HPG's new report 'Realising Protection' looks at the meaning and implications of three categories of protected status for non-combatants – ‘civilian’, ‘refugee’ and ‘internally displaced’ – and the frameworks of international law and custom and 'shifting political priorities and engagement by governments and regional and international actors' which surround them. Ultimately, they argue, 'it is the observance or otherwise of basic protection rules and norms by national and international duty-bearers that has the greatest impact on people’s safety, security and wellbeing'.

Liberia: Jeneh's story - moving on from war

ICRC in Yemen: Providing relief assistance to displaced people

Running out of/on water?!

Several messages in the past week have highlighted the various ways in which water is becoming more and more a challenge in the lives of disaster-afflicted populations.
In Kenya, for example, the first climate change refugees have given up their herder life styles to settle down to make charcoal or sell firewood. Droughts in the country have gone up from once every decade up to almost every year. This gives nomades too little time to recover from losses suffered. In addition to the greater scarcity in drinking water, drought-induced hunger is more and more becoming a security concern in the country as well, with higher levels of violence reported.
In a similar vein, Timor Leste President Ramos-Horta warns for land-and-water wars in the near future, unless more attention will be paid to the rural areas that are more and more affected by the disastrous impacts of climate change.
On the other hand, several countries, notably in the Caribbean area, are hit by hurricanes and floods with greater intensity every year, said John Holmes, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. If no drastic reduction in carbon house emissions is negotiated at Copenhagen in December, he warns, these extreme water conditions (both the lack and abundance of it) will lead to unprecedented population movements, with high potential for conflict.
In a response to these threats, Reuters reports,

A 155-nation conference in Geneva agreed on a plan to improve climate information to help people cope with ever more droughts, floods, sandstorms and rising sea levels projected this century. The plan for a "Global Framework for Climate Services" includes the appointment of a task force of high-level, independent advisors within four months.

The panel's report is expected in twelve months, with recommendations on among others disaster risks, human health, transport and tourism, managing water, energy and securing food supplies.

Change.org picks Kenya as a brewing troublespot

Michael Bear of the Humanitarian Relief blog on Change.org has listed Kenya with Chad and Southern Sudan as a coming humanitarian crisis. His analysis:

The stable bastion of east Africa. Except, well, for those rather brutal post-election riots in early 2008, the scars of which are still not completely healed. The Kenyan economy is forecasted to shrink next year, the first time the economy has contracted in almost a decade. Corruption is, if anything, growing worse, while the price of basic commodities is increasing - for instance, the cost of maize has doubled over the past year.

And, finally, we're looking at a full-blown food crisis in the coming months, as drought and spiraling prices have left 3.8 million Kenyans dependent on food assistance. (For a map of the drought early warning stages in Kenya, see here.)

An ineffective coalition government. A shrinking economy. Rising food prices. A recent history of violence. Not good, not good at all.

Read more here.

Happy World Humanitarian Day

19 August will from now on be dedicated to all humanitarians, commemorating those that have lost their lives doing their jobs. The day is very symbolic, as it coincides with the day that a bomb hit the UN compound in Iraq in 2003, leaving 22 deaths among the present UN personnel, including Sergio Vieira de Mello.

As a tribute to all humanitarians, there is now World Humanitarian Day. The family of de Mello also created a Sergio Vieira de Mello foundation to honour those people that have contributed in a special way to the humanitarian cause and to peace and conflict resolution.

It has also been a day to think about humanitarian action in the world of today. Many news sites have reported on the humanitarian space necessary to operate in safety honouring the humanitarian principles (IRIN/AlertNet), the growing lack of this space and the need for higher security measures for humanitarians in Afghanistan (IRIN, Mediapoint Press). Neil Barry, humanitarian specialist at ODI, has put up an interesting post reflecting on his two decades of experience as a humanitarian and humanitarianism in general.

IRIN: insecurity drives humanitarian organisations out of Pakistan

The growing insecurity in Pakistan has posed several difficulties for the security of staff from several humanitarian organisations, IRIN reports. Since the killing of four aid workers of PLAN international, many NGOs have left the North West Frontier Province, leaving all their beneficiaries behind with no other help coming in. This seems unlikely to change in the near future, as prospects for peace and safety to return remain bleak.

The withdrawal of the UN does not bode well for the province's impoverished people. The same holds true for other areas of Pakistan. "People have suffered, especially women, since NGOs began pulling out. It has meant less awareness, less enlightenment and there has also been a loss of jobs," Mahbano Shahid, an activist formerly employed with an NGO in Mansehra, told IRIN.

Also national agencies are targeted, in particular female aid workers raising awareness about family planning and women's rights.

Reuters: Abyei ruling settles Sudan land dispute

Last Wednesday, July 22, the Arbitration Court in the Hague settled with its ruling a long standing land dispute of the central, oil rich Sudanese region of Abyei. North Sudan gets a vast area where most of the oil fields ly, whereas the bulk of the region, including huge areas of fertile land and one significant oil field, has been given to Abyei - whose inhabitants are to decide in a Januari 2011 referendem whether or not they will join South Sudan, Reuters reported.

All parties have formally reaffirmed their adherence to the Hague ruling, yet some voices express their concern and remain sceptical on the peaceful outcome of events.

"The crucial thing will be whether both sides accept this ruling," Alex Vines, Africa specialist at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London, told Reuters. "Tensions have risen in the last few days and the next few months will be absolutely crucial."

For more reports, comments and analysis, see (among others): Refugees International, Enough, African Press International and Sudan Watch.
For more background on Abyei, see the briefing on the IRIN website[...]. Refugees International:

This is a fragile moment for peace and political progress between north and south Sudan. Recent media reports of southern Sudanese troop movements in the Abyei region underscore the tension and risk for more violence.

Enough:

Recent efforts to reinvigorate CPA implementation will be wasted if the international community does not work assiduously to reach a durable political settlement on Abyei and other outstanding issues. [...] Continued stalemate in Abyei is a recipe for a return to full-scale civil war, the humanitarian consequences of which are awful to contemplate.

Sudan Watch offers a whole lot of reactions from Sudanese officials on the ruling.

African Press International:

Abyei will continue to be a flashpoint, and sustained attention, including negotiations between the parties on long-term wealth-sharing arrangements related to Abyei’s oil reserves, are the only way to mitigate the risk that Abyei will unravel the North-South peace.

For more background on Abyei, see the briefing on the IRIN website.

Disasters: New Theme Issue on Reconstruction

ODI has published a new Disasters theme issue, Emerging Perspectives on the Politicisation of Reconstructing Conflict-Affected Countries. This issue tries to bridge the gap between academic reconstruction theories and the local practices:

Studies of reconstruction have, despite being a critical issue for many years, long suffered from an acute disassociation between theory and practice on the one hand and academic and policy circles on the other. Recent events in Iraq and Afghanistan have exacerbated these problems, necessitating a thorough and, perhaps most pertinently, critical evaluation of both the state of the debate and the state of the art. This theme issue aims to contribute to such a process of reflection by drawing on evidence from reconstruction efforts undertaken in a wide range of local contexts.

The theme issue contains the following articles:
Emerging patterns in the reconstruction of conflict-affected countries
'Rule of Law' initiatives and the liberal peace: the impact of politicised reform in post-conflict states
Insurgency, militias and DDR as part of security sector reconstruction in Iraq: how not to do it
The gift of disaster: the commodification of good intentions in post-tsunami Sri Lanka
Who owns the peace? Aid, reconstruction, and peacebuilding in Afghanistan
A very political reconstruction: governance and reconstruction in Lebanon after the 2006 war

This and other editions of Disasters are available from the BRC library, or online by emailing library@redcross.org.uk.[...].

The first contribution, Emerging patterns in the reconstruction of conflict-affected countries, contextualises the five main contributions to this issue. The overall argument that Tim Jacoby and Eric James make is that the comination of three patterns, 'marketisation', 'politicisation', and 'securitisation', has narrowed the space in which humanitarian and reconstructive interventions into conflict-affected countries are organised and undertaken.

In the second article, 'Rule of Law' initiatives and the liberal peace: the impact of politicised reform in post-conflict states, Jenny H. Peterson talks about how the instrumental use of RoL programming provides further evidence of weaknesses and contradictions within the politicised liberal peacebuilding project (since it increases security in the short term, but threatens the sustainability of peacebuilding reforms in the long run, as seen in Kosovo), necessitating reconsideration of its role in post-conflict transformations.

In Insurgency, militias and DDR as part of security sector reconstruction in Iraq: how not to do it, Alpaslam Ozerdem discusses the dangers and pitfalls of DDR in a highly complex and insecure environment such as Iraq.

Benedikt Korf et al. analyse in The gift of disaster: the commodification of good intentions in post-tsunami Sri Lanka, the perpetuation of the political economy that has driven social conflict and discontent in the post-independence years in Sri Lanka.

The fourth article, Who owns the peace? Aid, reconstruction, and peacebuilding in Afghanistan, by Jonathan Goodhand and Mark Sedra, examines how aid policies and programmes have become part of a complex bargaining game involving international actors, domestic elites, and societal groups. It argues that international donors' failure to appreciate or engage sensitively and strategically with these bargaining processes, when combined with contradictory intervention objectives, has contributed to the steady unravelling of a fragile war-to-peace transition in Afghanistan.

In the last contribution, A very political reconstruction: governance and reconstruction in Lebanon after the 2006 war, Christine Sylva Hamieh and Roger Mac Ginty examine how in general many Western states and Western-backed international institutions favoured governance programming (software) while many Arab and Gulf State donors preferred physical reconstruction projects (hardware), often with an emphasis on large-scale, high-visibility infrastructure projects. They argue that the latter were able to connect more effectively with the political culture of Lebanon.

IDRL: Lessons learnt from H1N1 and humanitarian evolutions in Sri Lanka

Three noteworthy topics signalled by the Federation's International Disaster Response Law programme:

• On July 5th, experts and representatives of 43 countries concluded the “Top Level Meeting on Influenza A (H1N1): Preparing for the Future”.
• In Sri Lanka, the Times reported, the government is starting to apply the tax law (0.9 per cent) on humanitarian aid it created in 2006, affecting 89 international and local humanitarian organisations, and potentially amounting to several millions of pounds.
• Furthermore, Reuters reported that the Sri Lankan government has asked for a reduction or scaling down in humanitarian operations, now that it declared total victory over the LTTE.

Some more information on these topics can be found in the extended blog entry.

On July 5th, experts and representatives of 43 countries concluded the “Top Level Meeting on Influenza A (H1N1): Preparing for the Future”. Some of the findings of this evaluatory meeting:

since international public health emergencies are unpredictable but recurrent and can severely affect human health and economic well-being worldwide, it is essential to reinforce public health capacity in order to permit timely actions to reduce the spread of disease.

Also, the experts and representatives

urged the WHO Director General to continue applying the procedure to determine an "internationally important public health emergency" and formulate the corresponding temporary recommendations.

In Sri Lanka, the Times reported, the government is starting to apply the tax law (0.9 per cent) on humanitarian aid it created in 2006, affecting 89 international and local humanitarian organisations, and potentially amounting to several millions of pounds.

The Government says that the tax is designed to crack down on NGOs that abused Sri Lankan law and squandered their funds on their own staff after the tsunami. Aid workers, however, say the new rules do not grant tax exemption for all the work they are doing — and want to do — to help 300,000 Tamil refugees in army-run camps. Some say the tax contravenes the international disaster response guidelines drawn up by the Red Cross in 2007 with the participation of 140 countries, including Sri Lanka.

However, some of the organisations, including Oxfam and Save the Children, have managed to negotiate their due tax with the government down to 0.1 per cent.
Furthermore, Reuters reported that the Sri Lankan government has asked for a reduction or scaling down in humanitarian operations, now that it declared total victory over the LTTE.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it was shutting down some of its offices in the country following the government's directive. "The ICRC is in the process of reviewing its setup and operational priorities in Sri Lanka," said the ICRC's head of operations for South Asia, Jacques de Maio. "As a first step, it will close its offices and withdraw its expatriate staff from the Eastern Province while winding down its operations in the area," he said. "The ICRC will continue its dialogue with the Sri Lankan government on issues of humanitarian concern."

HPN/Reuters: Afghanistan

In issue 43 of the Humanitarian Exchange Magazine, Jon Bennett writes about the the Britain Afghanistan policy and future expectations for the latter country. Recently, this policy has moved towards a strategy of stabilisation, linking DfID, MoD and the Foreign Office in a mutual strategy of engagement, stabilisation and development, aimed at bridging the counterinsurgency and the "Afghanisation" of the country's future.

More recent information on Afghanistan on the Civil-Military Relations blog:
Terrorism kills more Afghan civilians than any other military action - next to Afghan civilians, also international aid workers have been the target of increased terrorist attacks in the country. This raises many concerns in the light of the upcoming presidential elections on 20 August.
Cost of insecurity in Afghanistan impedes humanitarian work - humanitarian organisations diverge in their approach in dealing with the increased insecurity in the country, with the ICRC firmly avoiding armed escorts and demonstrating its impartial credentials and emblem.

A new pressrelease by Reuters tells about Karzai's plans in his election manifesto to regulate foreign troops in Afghanistan:

Afghan President Hamid Karzai , setting out his election manifesto, has vowed to make foreign troops sign a framework governing how they operate in a bid to limit civilian casualties. Karzai, widely criticised this week for withdrawing from a televised debate with two of his main rivals in the Aug. 20 presidential election, has unveiled a manifesto covering foreign troops, talks with insurgents and reconstruction. Civilian casualties caused by U.S. and NATO operations, particularly air strikes, have become a source of increasing outrage among ordinary Afghans and their leaders this year, even as insurgent violence hit its worst levels in the eight-year-old war.

More about this in the extended blog entry.
In issue 43 of the Humanitarian Exchange Magazine, Jon Bennett writes about the the Britain Afghanistan policy and future expectations for the latter country.

Recently, this policy has moved towards a strategy of stabilisation, linking DfID, MoD and the Foreign Office in a mutual strategy of engagement, stabilisation and development, aimed at bridging the counterinsurgency and the "Afghanisation" of the country's future.

It has been difficult for aid agencies and DFID to focus on reconstruction and development when access to populations is largely determined by which areas are ‘secured’ by British and Afghan military forces. Development here requires longer timeframes and a more sophisticated form of interaction with target beneficiaries. It is also difficult to find technical experts willing to stay on the ground for any length of time in a highly volatile and dangerous environment.

Also, there are two separate foreign military forces present on the ground - the Coalition Forces and the NATO/ISAF operation forces. However distinct, the public does not make a distinction between the two and their actions affect each other, potentially affecting the acceptance of their actions (and, concomitantly, of the aid agencies affiliated to them or operating under their protection). In reaction, several international aid agencies have expressed their desire to decouple aid delivery from military goals and refused to be any longer part of the Provincial Reconstruction Teams.

Further complicating these matters is a general lack of coherency between the major donors, lack of legitimacy of the central government and the fact that in the country as a whole, the lack of good national or provincial data and security constraints on access to beneficiaries impede an accurate assessment of project progress.

Here are some excerpts from the latest news items posted on the Civil-Military Relations blog.

13 July 2009: Terrorism kills more Afghan civilians than any other military action.

Recent violence has also targeted those trying to help the fledgling democracy rebuild. Last month three national staff members of a local non-governmental organization (NGO) were killed when the vehicle they were travelling in was destroyed by a roadside bomb in Jawzjan province. In addition, the office of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in Kunduz was attacked in early June with a rocket-propelled grenade having been fired at the compound.
The ongoing violence is of particular concern as the country gears up for presidential elections slated for 20 August. The Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan and head of UNAMA, Kai Eide, has highlighted the critical importance of the upcoming polls, noting that it is about more than choosing the country’s future leaders.

14 July 2009: Cost of insecurity in Afghanistan impedes humanitarian work.

While large swathes of the country, mostly in the south and east, are no-go zones for most agencies, the increasing use of armoured vehicles, barricaded compounds and restrictions on movement have also had an impact on operations in relatively safe areas, such as Kabul, where many organizations recommend armoured vehicles for their staff. [...]
However, some organizations like the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) prefer not to use them. “Armoured vehicles are both expensive and inconsistent with the nature of our work,” Patrick Hamilton, deputy head of the ICRC delegation, told IRIN, adding that the organisation was more inclined to seek security guarantees for its staff and activities through negotiations with warring parties and host communities. However, the ICRC’s modus operandi is extremely difficult, if not impossible, for other aid agencies to replicate, specialists say. [...]
The ICRC says it will continue avoiding armed escorts and demonstrating its impartial credentials and emblem. “We seek security through local acceptance and support,” said Hamilton. Others, including Donini, advise aid agencies to negotiate a “humanitarian consensus” with all warring parties and neighbouring countries as the UN did in the 1980 and 1990s. “Immediate steps should be taken to build a relationship of trust with all parties to the conflict,” said Donini.

Tufts: Development/Conflict Nexus in Nepal

The Feinstein International Center released a new report in June on the connection between aid and violence in Nepal and how they interacted in the last decade. The study was made by Francesca Bonino and Antonio Donini and is part of a wider ongoing research program in Nepal that tackles social transformation, gender and migration issues in a post-conflict environment.

The report explores this question through a retrospective analysis of the development/conflict nexus in Nepal. It looks at the underlying causes of the Maoist success story, in relation to the conditions of structural underdevelopment and violence, and at donors’ policies and activities in Nepal and at their interplay with the conflict environment. The report focuses on the last decade (1996-2008), the period of the Maoist insurgency and of the subsequent largely successful peace process. It looks at the way in which aid actors in Nepal framed their understanding of the Maoist insurgency and how they adapted their responses. It shows that, because the aid community was Kathmandu-centric, it did not fully grasp the nature of caste, class and ethnic discrimination in rural Nepal nor that “development” was not benefiting the most disadvantaged groups. Development failure can thus be construed as a contributing factor to the insurgency.

HPG: Sara Pantuliano on the impact of Darfur expulsions on the Three Areas

The expulsion of 12 foreign aid agencies and one private development firm and the suspension of three national NGOs by the Sudanese government following the issuing of an international arrest warrant for President Bashir has generated widespread concerns about the potential impact of an interruption of aid on civilians at risk. These concerns have, though, been largely limited to Darfur. Worryingly, very little attention has been focused on the repercussions these expulsions could have on the Three Areas (Abyei, Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile) and the eastern region which have only recently emerged from conflict and remain highly volatile.

Read more on Alertnet.

Sara has written about the consequences of the expulsion of the 13 major aid agencies for people relying on assistance in Darfur - download a pdf report here.