Carmen J. Walters became the 14th president of Tougaloo College on July 1. She is the second female president of Tougaloo after her predecessor, Beverly Wade Hogan, who held the position since 2002. Photo by Jordan Williams
Carmen J. Walters became the 14th president of Tougaloo College on July 1. Tougaloo College Board of Trustees Chairman Wesley F. Prater named her to the position on March 18, 2019. She is the second female president of Tougaloo after her predecessor, Beverly Wade Hogan, who held the position since 2002.
Walters previously served as executive vice president of enrollment management, student success and institutional relations at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College in Perkinston from 2013 to 2019. She also worked at Delgado Community College in New Orleans for 18 years, where she served as assistant vice chancellor of human resources, executive assistant to the chancellor, and assistant to the vice chancellor for academic and student affairs. Walters also previously worked as an instructor for Jefferson Parish Department of Employment and Training in Louisiana and as a high-school teacher in New Orleans.
She received a bachelor’s degree in accounting and business administration from Southern University in Louisiana in 1984, a master’s in postsecondary counseling from Xavier College in New Orleans in 1990 and her PhD in community-college leadership from Mississippi State University in 2009.
Walters is a board member with Mississippi Women in Higher Education, Mississippi Girl Scouts of Greater Mississippi, the United Way for Jackson & George Counties, the National Congress of Black Women and Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. She is also a member of the Jackson County Chamber of Commerce and the National Council on Black American Affairs.
USM and University of Indiana Partner for School Ground-Breaking in Africa
The University of Southern Mississippi’s College Panhellenic Council, which comprises eight on-campus sororities that are members of the National Panhellenic Council, partnered with the University of Indiana to organize a trip to Malawi, Africa, to conduct a ground-breaking for a new school there.
Malawi is located in southeast Africa and has a population of around 18 million. The country is one of the world’s least-developed countries, USM’s release says, with roughly 85% of the population living in rural areas.
USM and UI began raising funds for the project through the Circle of Sisterhood, a nonprofit sorority organization that promotes education for women and girls in impoverished nations, in 2016.
Megan Wilkinson, assistant director of fraternity and sorority life at USM, and four USM students joined students from UI to hold the ground-breaking in Kasiya Village in Malawi on May 23, 2019. The students also joined laborers from Malawi to assist with initial construction work on the building for two weeks.
The school will house students in grades one through eight. A release from USM states that construction should be finished within another six months.
The principal of the Samo Alto rural school, Omar Santander, shows organic tomatoes in the greenhouse built by teachers, students and their families, who raise the crops irrigated with rainwater or recycled water in Coquimbo, a region of northern Chile where rainfall is scarce. Credit: Orlando Milesi/IPS
OVALLE, Chile, Jul 4 2019 (IPS) – Children from the neighboring municipalities of Ovalle and Río Hurtado in northern Chile are harvesting rain and recycling greywater in their schools to irrigate fruit trees and vegetable gardens, in an initiative aimed at combating the shortage of water in this semi-arid region.
And other youngsters who are completing their education at a local polytechnic high school built a filter that will optimise the reuse and harvesting of water.
“The care of water has to start with the children,” Alejandra Rodríguez, who has a son who attends the school in Samo Alto, a rural village on the slopes of the Andes Mountains in Río Hurtado, a small municipality of about 4,000 inhabitants in the Coquimbo region, told IPS.
“My son brought me a tomato he harvested, to use the seeds. For them, the harvest is the prize. He planted his garden next to the house and it was very exciting,” said Maritza Vega, a teacher at the school, which has 77 students ranging in age from four to 15.
The principal of the school, Omar Santander, told IPS during a tour of rural schools in the area involved in the project that “the Hurtado River (which gives the municipality its name) was traditionally generous, but today it only has enough water for us to alternate the crops that are irrigated, every few days. People fight over watering rights.”
The Samo Alto school collects rainwater and recycles water after different uses. “The water is then sent to a double filter,” he explained, pointing out that they have a pond that holds 5,000 liters.
The monthly water bill is much lower, but Santander believes that the most important thing “is the awareness it has generated in the children.”
“There used to be water here, and the adults’ habits come from back then. The students help raise awareness in their families. We want the environmental dimension to be a tool for life,” he said.
For Admalén Flores, a 13-year-old student, “the tomatoes you harvest are tastier and better,” while Alexandra Honores, also 13, said “my grandfather now reuses water.”
El Guindo primary school, located 10 kilometers from the city of Ovalle, the municipal seat, in a town known as a hotspot for drug sales, performed poorly in tests until three years ago.
At that time, the principal, Patricio Bórquez, and the science teacher, Gisela Jaime, launched a process of greywater recovery. They also planted trees and native species of plants to adapt to the dry environment of the municipality of 111,000 inhabitants, located about 400 kilometers north of Santiago.
Four students, ages 13 and 14, talk to IPS about how the water reuse project has made them aware of the importance of taking care of water in the semi-arid territory where they live, in a classroom at the rural school of El Guindo, in the municipality of Ovalle, Chile. Credit: Orlando Milesi/IPS
“The project was born because there was no vegetation,” said the teacher. Today they recover 8,000 litres of water a month. “Teaching care for the environment provides a life skill,” said Bórquez.
“Our school had the stigma of being in a place rife with drug addiction. Today in Ovalle we are known as the school with the most programs. We placed third in science,” she said.
Jaime described the experience as “gratifying” because it has offered “tools to grow and create awareness among children and the entire community about the importance of caring for water and other resources.”
Geographer Nicolás Schneider, founder of the “Un Alto en el Desierto” Foundation, told IPS that his non-governmental organisation estimates that one million litres of greywater have been recovered after eight years of work with rural schools in Ovalle.
In this arid municipality with variable rainfall, “only 37.6 mm of rainwater fell in 2018 – well below the normal average for the 1981-2010 period of 105.9 mm,” Catalina Cortés, an expert with Chile’s meteorology institute, told IPS from Santiago.
Schneider describes the water situation as critical in the Coquimbo region, which is on the southern border of the Atacama Desert and where 90 percent of the territory is eroded and degraded.
“Due to climate change, it is raining less and less and when it does, the rainfall is very concentrated. Both the lack of rain and the concentration of rainfall cause serious damage to the local population,” she said.
Innovative recycling filter
With guidance from their teachers, students at the Ovalle polytechnic high school built a filtration system devised by Eduardo Leiva, a professor of chemistry and pharmacy at the Catholic University. The filter seeks to raise the technical standard with which greywater is purified.
Duan Urqueta, 17, a fourth-year electronics student at the Ovalle polytechnic high school, describes the award-winning greywater filter he helped to build. Initially, units will be installed in eight rural schools in this municipality in northern Chile. Credit: Orlando Milesi/IPS
The prototype recycles the greywater from the bathrooms used by the 1,200 students at the polytechnic high school. This water is used to irrigate three areas with 48 different species of trees. Similar filters will be installed in eight rural schools in Ovalle.
The quality of the recovered water will improve due to the filter built thanks to a project by the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness of the regional government of Coquimbo, with the participation of the Catholic University, the “Un Alto en el Desierto” Foundation, and the Ovalle polytechnic high school.
The prototype was built by 18 students and eight teachers of mechanics, industrial assembly, electronics, electricity and technical drawing, and includes two 1,000-litre ponds.
The primary pond holds water piped from the bathroom sinks by gravity which is then pumped to a filter consisting of three columns measuring 0.35 meters high and 0.40 meters in diameter.
“The filter material in each column…can be activated charcoal, sand or gravel,” said Hernán Toro, the head teacher of industrial assembly.
Toro told IPS that “the prototype has a column with zeolite and two columns of activated charcoal. The columns are mounted on a metal structure 2.60 meters high.”
View of the water cleaning filter designed at the Ovalle polytechnic high school and built by a group of teachers and students with funding from the government of the region of Coquimbo, in northern Chile. Each unit costs 2,170 dollars and it will promote water recycling in the schools in the semi-arid municipality. Credit: Orlando Milesi/IPS
The water is pumped from the pond to the filter’s highest column, passes through the filter material and by gravity runs sequentially through the other columns. Finally, the water is piped into the secondary pond and by means of another electric pump it reaches the irrigation system.
Duan Urqueta, a 17-year-old electronics student, told IPS that they took soil and water samples in seven towns in Ovalle and “we used the worst water to test the filter that is made here at the high school with recyclable materials.”
In 2018, “we won first place with the filter at the Science Fair in La Serena, the capital of the region of Coquimbo,” he said proudly.
Pablo Cortés, a 17-year-old student of industrial assembly, said the project “changed me as a person.”
Toro said the experience “has been enriching and has had a strong social impact. We are sowing the seeds of ecological awareness in the students.”
“It’s a programme that offers learning, service, and assistance to the community. Everyone learns. We have seen people moved to the point of tears in their local communities,” the teacher said.
Now they are going to include solar panels in the project, which will cut energy costs, while they already have an automation system to discharge water, which legally can only be stored for a short time.
Eight schools, including the ones in Samo Alto and El Guindo, are waiting for the new filters, which cost 2,170 dollars per unit.
Schneider believes, however, that at the macro level “water recycling is insufficient” to combat the lack of water in this semi-arid zone. And he goes further, saying “there is an absence of instruments for territorial planning or management of watersheds.”
“Under the current water regulatory framework, the export agribusiness, mainly of fruit, has taken over the valleys, concentrating water use…and the government turns a blind eye,” he complained.
NEW YORK, Jul 3 2019 (IPS) – Sri Lanka continues to be on a security alert long after the devastation caused by a string of bombings on Easter Sunday this year.
Raisa Wickrematunge, Editor of Groundviews, told IPS: “There has been a tightening of security. There are now security checks being carried out outside hotels and shopping malls – either through scanners or bag and body searches”.
“At the St Anthony’s Church, where the first blast occurred, there are bag and body searches conducted before worshippers can go inside, and bags are left outside the Church premises. Many churches and some schools have also increased their security.”
Curfews were put into place and a social media ban was enacted temporarily, in order to prevent the graphic nature of the tragedies from being broadcast publicly. There has been much damage of the emotional and physical varieties in the once war ridden nation.
For one thing, this attack was not expected by the Christian minority in Sri Lanka. Despite this, they have persevered.
Father Rohan Dominic of the Claretian NGO told IPS: “For quite some time, there were attacks on the Muslim and Christian minorities by extremist Buddhists. In places, where the Buddhists were the majority, Christians lived in fear.”
However, in a turn of events that left many in shock, one of the minority groups seemed to be the ones that initiated the attacks that occurred on Easter.
All seven of the perpetrators allegedly belonged to a local Islamist group, National Thowheeth Jama’ath, according to government officials from the country.
In response to this, there have been bans put in place for burqas and niqabs, traditional facial coverings worn by Muslims and people have been denied entrance into establishments, even while wearing hijabs.
There were smaller bombings in Dematagoda and Dehiwala later on that same day. With a death toll of 290 people and 500 injured, domestic measures to protect the citizens were taken.
After its 26 year long civil war between the Tamil and Sinhalese ethnic groups came to an end in 2009, conditions in Sri Lanka were mostly calm.
However, on 21 April, 2019, the country erupted into violence. Three churches in the cities of Negombo, Batticaloa and Colombo, along with three hotels in the city of Colombo, were targeted in bombings by a group of seven Sri Lankan citizens.
The churches were St. Sebastian’s Church, Shrine of St. Anthony Church and Zion Church and the hotels were Cinnamon Grand, Kingsbury Hotel and Shangri-La Hotel.
Sri Lanka is a country that is primarily Buddhist with a large Hindu population and Christian and Muslim minorities.
Father Dominic said that, “The Catholic Church in Sri Lanka was able to recover from the attack quickly and aided the survivors and the families of the victims by consoling and caring for them. The Church also has guided the Christian community at moments of anger and frustration in controlling their emotions and not to blame the Muslims. This position of the Church has helped to prevent violence and created common understanding and religious harmony.”
According to Wickrematunge, there has been much help in helping the community adjust to life after the attacks and in restoring what has been lost.
Other efforts have been led by organisations such as the Red Cross, Kind-hearted Lankans, the Archbishop of Colombo and the Church of the American Ceylon Mission in Batticaloa. There have also been crowdfunding efforts on popular websites like GoFundMe.
Since the attacks have affected lives in a physical and emotional way, the state has given financial support to the affected as of 21 June.
There has also been a trust fund set up for children who have lost family members to the attacks.
Some of the industries affected, such as tourism, have been offered subsidized loans in order to help with paying employees. Psychological support and educational resources are being provided to citizens as well.
While it has only been three months since the attacks affected the lives of many, steps towards rebuilding have been made and the future appears to be promising.
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 3 2019 (IPS) – How effective is the global war on drugs?
The latest statistics released by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) are staggering: 35 million people across the globe currently have a substance use disorder, and as of 2017, 585,000 people have died worldwide as a result of drug use.
According to a recently-released UNODC report, the lack of proficient drug treatment and facilities for those that need it is impacting mortality rates at alarming levels.
Hence, it stands to reason that treatment and prevention are immensely falling short of the mark on a global scale.
Prisons are also no exception to these shortcomings. In fact, the Report unmasked that those incarcerated for drugs are more likely to continue being exposed to drugs.
The Report also highlighted that out of the 149 countries that were surveyed, about 1 in 3 people reported that they consumed drugs in prison at least once while incarcerated, and 1 in 5 people who are currently incarcerated reported that they have used drugs within the past month.
“In terms of data, we did some data collection, always trying to get as much as possible, in terms of socio-economic characteristics, we would have this type of data, I imagine, and this is also something that will run throughout the new report, and is being discussed now.” Chloé Carpentier, Chief of the Drug Research Section told IPS.
The issue between drugs and human rights is on Secretary General António Guterres’ radar as well.
“Together, we must honour the unanimous commitments made to reduce drug abuse, illicit trafficking and the harm that drugs cause, and to ensure that our approach promotes equality, human rights, sustainable development, and greater peace and security.” Secretary General António Guterres stated on the International Day Against Drug Use and Illicit Trafficking.
“We will make sure that no one with a drug problem is left behind” Dr. Miwa Kato assured, during the official launch of the Report on June 26.
Dr. Kato continued to push this message throughout her speech and cited that “Health and justice need to work hand in hand.”
Beyond the UN, this is a topic of interest for the academia world as well, since young people are heavily susceptible to a substance use disorder.
“It is important that we say people— not user or addicts, that language itself is stigmatizing.” Dr. Danielle Ompad, Associate Professor, College of Global Public Health and Deputy Director, Center for Drug Use and HIV Research at New York University (NYU) told IPS.
Dr. Ompad highlighted the importance of person-first language, citing that “It is important how we refer to people, and view them as humans, and not just the behavior (the substance use).
In terms of the World Drug Report, she noted that “The war on drugs, if you look at it, hasn’t really been an effective war”, and elaborated that the focus should not be supply- side intervention, because in the long run, drugs are going to be produced and sold no matter what, which leads to mass incarceration, which doesn’t benefit any party.
It is also important to recognize that “not everyone needs treatment, and those that do should absolutely have access to it. But just because you use marijuana does not mean you are an addict”.
She went on to suggest a harm- reduction approach. The harm-reduction approach blends a plethora of strategies from safer use to managed use to abstinence- it meets the need of the person.
Meanwhile, tracing back to the issue of treatment, the Report affirmed that over 80% of the world’s population lack access to adequate treatment with only 1 out of 7 people with a substance use disorder receiving treatment each year.
The Report showcased that women cited a strong sense of fear that kept them from seeking the help that they needed for a variety of reasons that ranged from possible legal issues to the lack of childcare while in treatment.
Another issue is several countries, particularly in Asia, is the death penalty for any person found guilty of a drug ‘offense.’
Last month, Sri Lanka’s President, Maithripala Sirisena signed death warrants for four convicts- thus pushing the notion that those who have a substance use disorder are ‘dirty’ and should be disposed of.
Similarly, in a 2014 study conducted by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, it was shown that having a substance use disorder was viewed more negatively than mental illness. Ironically, however, the two are all but intertwined.
This is also evidenced by the Report- about half of the world’s population that develop a mental disorder will also experience a substance use disorder in their lifetime.
However, it is to be noted, that despite all of the above, the Report only cited the “lack of effective treatment interventions based on scientific evidence and in line with human rights obligations.” but made no further elaborations on the what’s and how’s and was only discussed briefly at the official Report launch.
That said, the issue of ensuring those that do have a substance use disorder are provided for while figuring out more beneficial and healthier initiatives to reduce drug rates across the globe are currently being discussed among the United Nations (UN) and United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Dr. Ompad said for better or worse, licit, and illicit drug use is part of our world.
“Focus a little bit more on harm reduction,” Dr. Ompad stated, and above all “We need to stop the war on the people who use drugs,” she declared.
The Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) was held in Bonn, Germany and focused on how to give land rights the visibility needed to showcase that a rights approach, particularly when it comes to indigenous people, is a solution to the climate change crisis. Courtesy: Pilar Valbuena/GLF
Jun 29 2019 (IPS) – The Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) was held in Bonn, Germany to rally behind a new approach to achieving a future that is more inclusive and sustainable than the present – through the establishment of secure and proper rights for all.
On Jun. 22 and 23, experts, political leaders, NGOs and indigenous peoples and communities gathered to deliberate on a methodology that emphasises rights for indigenous peoples and local communities in the management and perseveration of landscapes. The forum took place alongside the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Bonn Climate Change Conference.
The forum focused giving land rights the visibility needed to showcase that a rights approach is a solution to the climate change crisis, and to develop a ‘gold standard’ for rights.
Indigenous peoples, local communities, women and youth, are believed to be the world’s most important environmental stewards but they are also among the most threatened and criminalised groups with little access to rights.
“We’re defending the world, for every single one of us,” said Geovaldis Gonzalez Jimenez, an indigenous peasant leader from Montes de María, Colombia.
But industries such as fossil fuels, large-scale agriculture, mining and others are not only endangering landscapes but also the lives of the people therein.
Already this year, said Gonzalez, his region witnessed 135 murders, adding that the day before the start of the GLF a local leader was killed in front of a 9-year-old boy.
It is for this reason that amid the urgency to meet Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) under pressure from the climate threat, dialogues about the global future have begun to wake up to the fact that indigenous peoples’ relationships with the natural world are not only crucial to preserve for their own sakes, but for everyone’s.
Wider discussions and workshops over the two days served as a consultation on the draft (which is expected to be finalised by the end of the year) as a concrete guide for organisations, institutions, governments and the private sector on how to apply different principles of rights. This includes the rights to free, prior and informed consent; gender equality; respect to cultural heritage; and education.
U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Vicky Tauli-Corpuz said lands managed by indigenous peoples with secure rights have lower deforestation rates, higher biodiversity levels and higher carbon storage than lands in government-protected areas.
But Diel Mochire Mwenge, who leads the Initiative Programme for the Development of the Pygme in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), one of the largest indigenous forest communities in Central Africa, said he has witnessed more than one million people being evicted from the national parkland where they have long lived. He explained that they had not been given benefits from the ecotourism industries brought in to replace them and were left struggling to find new income sources.
“Our identity is being threatened, and we need to avoid being completely eradicated,” said Mwenge.
In Jharkhand, India, activist Gladson Dungdung, whose parents were murdered in 1990 for attending a court case over a local land dispute, said an amendment to India’s Forest Rights Act currently being reviewed by the Supreme Court could see 7.5 million indigenous peoples evicted from their native forest landscapes. The act can impact a further 90 million people who depend on these forests’ resources for their survival, he said.
The amendment, Dungdung said, would also give absolute power to the national forest guard; if a guard were to see someone using the forest for hunting or timber collection, they could legally shoot the person on-sight.
“Indigenous peoples are right on the frontline of the very real and dangerous fight for the world’s forests,” said actor and indigenous rights activist Alec Baldwin in a video address.
“Granted that indigenous peoples are the superheroes of the environmental movement,” Jennifer Morris, president of Conservation International wondered why they are not heard until they become victims. “Why do we not hear about these leaders until they’ve become martyrs for this cause?”
The examples of intimidation, criminalisation, eviction and hardship shared throughout the first day clearly showcased what indigenous peoples and local communities go through to preserve the forests or ‘lungs of the earth’.
The rights approach, according to conveners of the GLF, aims to strengthen respect, recognition and protection of the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities as stewards and bearers of solutions to landscape restoration, conservation, and sustainable use. It also aims to end persecution of land and environment defenders; build partnerships to enhance engagement and support for rights-based approaches to sustainable landscapes across scales and sectors; and, scale up efforts to legally recognise and secure collective land and resource rights across landscapes.
“By implementing a gold standard, we can both uphold and protect human rights and develop conservation, restoration and sustainable development initiatives that embrace the key role Indigenous peoples and local communities are already playing to protect our planet,” said Joan Carling, co-convener of IPMG.
IPMG recognises that indigenous and local communities are bearers of rights and solutions to common challenges.
“This will enable the partnership that we need to pave the way for a more sustainable, equitable and just future,” added Carling.
And the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) Director General, Robert Nasi, said when rights of local communities and indigenous peoples are recognised, there are significant benefits for the fight against climate change and environmental degradation.
“Whoever controls the rights over these landscapes has a very important part to play in fighting climate change,” he said.
In the climate and development arenas, the most current alarm being sounded is for rights–securing the land rights and freedoms of indigenous peoples, local communities and the marginalised members therein.
How can these custodians of a quarter of the world’s terrestrial surface be expected to care for their traditional lands if the lands don’t, in fact, belong to them? Or, worse, if they’re criminalised and endangered for doing so?
The basic principles of a ‘gold standard’ already exist, such as free, prior and informed consent, according to Alain Frechette of the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI). What has been lacking, he said, is the application of principles that could be boosted by high-level statements that could “spur a race to the top”.
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 26 2019 (IPS) – The feeling in the air at a recent meeting of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) was one of compassion and benevolence.
The focus was on children as Foreign Terrorist Fighters (FTFs), a subject that everyone at the panel discussion argued is delicate and politically sensitive.
Alexandra Martins, the Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Officer at the UNODC, pointed out that “”Nobody is a lost cause, and there is always a possibility to rehabilitate and reintegrate children from these groups.”
Two of her words were repeated by almost every speaker: “rehabilitate and reintegrate”.
The meeting was meant to discuss the release of the UNODC Handbook on Children Recruited and Exploited by Terrorist and Violent Extremist Groups.
The roadmap’s main goal is to provide UN’s 193 Member States with guidance on how to treat children associated with terrorist and violent extremist groups. It argues for an approach to rehabilitate those associated with or accused of being FTFs, and to reintegrate them back into their communities.
Though many of the children accused have taken part in terrorism, the UNODC advocates for a change in the way Member States handle the children.
Speaking during the release of the handbook, Dr. Jehangir Khan, Director at the UN Office of Counter-Terrorism/Counter Terrorism Centre (UN OCT/CCT), said “children must be seen first and foremost as victims.”
The roadmap was released alongside 4 technical assistance tools: UNODC Handbook on Children Recruited and Exploited by Terrorist and Violent Extremist Groups: The Role of the Justice System (2018); the UNODC Training Manual on Prevention of Child Recruitment by Terrorist and Violent Extremist Groups (May 2019); the UNODC Training Manual on Rehabilitation and Reintegration of Child Victims of Recruitment by Terrorist and Violent Extremist Groups (to be released in July 2019); the UNODC Training Manual on Justice for Children in the Context of Counter-Terrorism (May 2019).
The documents are based on three years of technical assistance work conducted by the UNODC to Member States that have found children as FTFs.
One country already advocating its support for the Roadmap is Lebanon. Until 2013, children accused of being or associated with terrorist fighters were kept in adult prisons and tried as such.
“It is in prison that I learned the meaning of life” one of the boys, aged 19, remarked in a video played by the representative from Lebanon stated.
A step in the direction of treating children as victims came in 2013, when they were moved to a juvenile prison.
Lebanon’s Head of the Prison Administration at the Ministry of Justice of Lebanon, Judge Raja AbiNader, said: “By showing them the same respect we showed the rest of the children, things started to change.”
Martins told IPS that there are many such countries, like Lebanon, whose children and communities have already benefited from the guidance offered in the Roadmap.
“As a result of the protocol, children deprived of liberty for association with Boko Haram were released and transferred to child protection authorities to begin a process of reintegration in their communities,” she said.
Martins stated that more than 30 countries have received guidance on child FTFs from the UNODC’s, from 6 different regions (West Africa, East Africa, Middle East and North Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia and Central Asia).
Despite the Roadmap offering guidance, at the panel discussion, Martins clarified that “there is no one size fits all approach” on handling children.
There have been different approaches offered on handling the children in general, and specifically when dealing with different genders.
There will be a second event during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in September that Martins hopes will “promote the guidance further.”
Gender and the Roadmap
But there appears to be some disagreement still on the treatment of boys and girls during the rehabilitation and reintegration processes.
Under international law (Havana Rule 87.d., Bangkok Rules), boys and girls must be held in separate detention facilities. But the Roadmap encourages them to still engage together, to foster development.
The Roadmap also advocates for targeted approaches on the treatment of girls.
Martins told IPS that girls are “considerably more vulnerable to both physical and sexual abuse and require special attention in this regard.”
She noted that “girls deprived of liberty are exposed to other forms of sexual violence such as threats of rape, touching, ‘virginity testing’, being stripped naked, invasive body searches, insults and humiliations of a sexual nature.”
Given these sensitive issues, and the fact that girls are different physiologically and often psychologically from boys at certain development stages, the Roadmap advocates for an awareness of gender and for specific targeted approaches.
“A section in the manual alludes that girl victims of recruitment and exploitation by terrorist and violent extremist groups require specific approaches to reintegration, because of their increased exposure to violence at multiple levels and from different actors,” Martins said.
But it is not clear yet that this section on gender differences has been implemented.
While Martins says the Roadmap takes seriously the different approaches for girls and boys, Judge AbiNader told IPS that in Lebanon “Very honestly, we’re not working specifically with girls concerning rehabilitation.”
As of June 7th, Lebanon has 10 boys and 2 girls in prison for being associated with or accused of being FTFs.
When asked why there were not specific programs that tackle children of divergent genders differently, he argued that they girls “should be treated the same” during rehabilitation.
“And it hasn’t been discussed because the number [of girls in prison for accusations of being FTFs] is so low,” he added.
Despite the low numbers of accused girls in detention facilities, Martins believes that targeted women’s health education should be provided, and that “Access to age- and gender-specific programmes and services, such as counselling for sexual abuse or violence, has to be given to girls.”
Though the UNODC has advocated a change in outlook on children involved with terrorist organizations, the Roadmap’s release is just the beginning of that change being implemented.
The documents are based on three years of technical assistance work conducted by the UNODC to Member States that have found children as FTFs.
