Thu, 21 Oct 2004

TEAR Fund believes new development model in Iraq required.

TEAR Fund New Zealand joins the international development community in condemning the kidnap of Care International's Margaret Hassan by Iraqi insurgents.

TEAR Fund acknowledges the peril involved in operating in Iraq, and believes during this period of instability, a new model of NGO operation is required. This involves using inconspicuous individuals, working within a decentralised environment.

This development model allows NGO staff to operate unhindered, and without attracting attention to their activities.

Using this model, TEAR Fund is distributing medical supplies, equipment, furniture and educational material to hospital units in Baghdad and Basra.

"The need in Iraq is to great to abandon the nation. Using a decentralized structure, we have been able to continue development unhindered," says TEAR Fund Executive Director Stephen Tollestrup.

Iraq's hospitals have been left dilapidated by Saddam Hussein's regime, international sanctions, the war and subsequent looting.

ENDS

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>