Gloria R. Lalumia's World Media Watch for January 21, 2008

WORLD MEDIA WATCH

Summaries are excerpted from the source articles; the featured article follows the summary section.

1//Inter Press Service News Agency, Italy
FOR IRAQIS, TREATMENT FOR TRAUMA IS LUXURY

The young woman was walking with her husband along a Baghdad street when she was abducted, held captive and raped repeatedly by five militia men for several days. "Before, she was very proud of her body but now she is overweight -- she eats to protect herself and not to attract people," says therapist Sana Hamzeh about her 27-year-old Iraqi patient, who recently escaped to Lebanon as a refugee. "When she first came here she hated her body and was very isolated. She could not touch her husband. She sat rigidly, clenched; she could not relax or talk about her feelings." Hamzeh works at the recently opened Restart centre in Beirut, a charity funded by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) that provides free therapy and psychological therapy rehabilitation for up to 70 mostly Iraqi refugees who are victims of torture. The centre also gathers documentation to help argue their case for asylum. The centre is a brief respite for a few Iraqis fleeing torture, death sentences and the grinding violence of daily life back home. But they arrive in Lebanon only to find themselves dangerously illegal, and subject to discrimination and exploitation. Few can find counselling and support. "We have many challenges," project director Suzanne Jabbour tells IPS. "First, people are afraid to get psychological help because it's not normal in Lebanese, or Iraqi culture. Second, we need to learn about Iraqi culture, history and traditions to deal with people. The third challenge is that Iraqis are treated inhumanely here. Most have low self-esteem, and because they don't know how things work, they can't adapt quickly." ... Since Lebanon is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention, refugees are afforded little protection with UNHCR-issued identification, and are prey to what Human Rights Watch calls "the whim of the law enforcement officer at the checkpoint." Those arrested are sent back to Iraq after they serve out prison sentences alongside criminals, or detained indefinitely if they refuse to go home. These hard realities contribute to the UN agency's low registration of 10,000 refugees, and to the isolation of the rest. ... Restart's goal this coming year is to reach out to those suffering torture or trauma from the 40,000 Iraqis not registered with UNHCR. "We want to open community-based rehabilitation centres because not all refugees can travel to our office here," explains Jabbour. "We will train charities, health professionals and lawyers on how to work with refugees, and how to document the legal, physical and psychological aspects of torture."

AN EXPANDED EXCERPT OF THIS FEATURED ARTICLE FOLLOWS THE SUMMARIES

2//ExpressIndia.com, India
UK FAVOURS UNSC SEAT FOR INDIA, ENTRY INTO G-8

Favouring greater role for New Delhi in the global arena, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown backed its bid for permanent membership of the UN Security Council and sought expansion to G-8 to include India in it in view of the ‘new realities'. "India should become a member of the UNSC," Brown said while speaking at the UK-India Entrepreneurship Summit at the IIT here soon after his arrival on a two-day visit. India is bidding for permanent membership of expanded UNSC, arguing that its inclusion in the powerful body was essential as part of reforms of the 60-year-old organisation. Brown, who is on his maiden visit here as Prime Minister, also sought expansion of G-8 bloc of developed countries to include India. Maintaining that New Delhi needs to have a ‘prominent role' in the expanded G-8, he said "There is no future for any big economic bloc which does not include India." India, along with China, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa, is a member of five Outreach countries of the G-8 and there have been suggestions to expand the eight-nation grouping of industrialised world to include them. The issue of G-8 expansion to include the "major threshold nations" as full members was expected to be discussed at the last Summit in Germany's Heiligendamm but the issue was skirted because of "different views".

3//Asharq Alawsat, UK
LEBANON PRESIDENTIAL VOTE DELAYED TO FEB. 11

A parliament session due on Monday to elect Lebanon's president has been postponed to February 11, despite Arab mediation to break the deadlock, the parliament speaker's office announced on Sunday. "Monday's session has been postponed until February 11 to allow further dialogue between the different parties on the Arab initiative," the office of speaker Nabih Berri said in a statement. Lebanon has been without a president since pro-Syrian Emile Lahoud stepped down on November 23 amid a deadlock in parliament between the Western-backed ruling majority and the opposition, which is backed by Syria and Iran. The latest delay brings to 13 the number of sessions that have had to be postponed since September, amid failure by the rival parties to pick a successor to Lahoud.

4//The Toronto Star, Canada
OTTAWA REVERSES TORTURE STANCE

The Canadian government now says Guantanamo Bay, the United States and Israel were mistakenly included as sites of possible torture in a government manual that was inadvertently disclosed last week. Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier said yesterday he has ordered the manual be rewritten and assured the U.S. and Israel the document did not reflect the government's position. "I regret the embarrassment caused by the public disclosure of the manual used in the department's torture awareness training. It contains a list that wrongly includes some of our closest allies," Bernier said in a written statement. His comments yesterday enraged human rights lawyers who accused the government of playing politics rather than guarding the rights of its citizens. "This is what we've always suspected. It's outrageous," Toronto lawyer Lorne Waldman said yesterday. "The government is more concerned with international relations than making sure Canadian citizens aren't tortured." ... Amnesty's Canadian secretary general said yesterday he was disappointed by Bernier's statement. "To see now that they're pulling back and clearly the motivation for that is not that there's been some reassessment of the human rights records of those countries, but rather only the concern that we don't want to embarrass close allies. That's disturbing," Alex Neve said yesterday.

5//Gulfnews.com, United Arab Emirates
UN QUIZZES SAUDIS ON WOMEN'S RIGHTS

Saudi Arabia, appearing for the first time before a UN women's rights panel on Thursday, faced tough questions over restrictions on "virtually every aspect of a woman's life" in the kingdom. The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women monitors adherence to a 1979 international bill of rights for women. The country ratified that pact in 2000, with the proviso that Sharia (Islamic law) would prevail if there were any contradiction with its provisions. Saudi Arabia came under fire during the debate for its system of male guardianship. Heisoo Shin, one of the 23 independent experts on the panel, said that patriarchal rules "governed virtually every aspect of a woman's life". "Without a man's consent, a woman cannot study or get health service, work, marry, conduct business or even get an ambulance service in an emergency," she said. ... the recent application of Sharia law in a rape case fanned concerns about the status of women in the Islamic state, where clerics demand the strict seclusion of females.

FEATURED ARTICLE

1//Inter Press Service News Agency, Italy January 18, 2008

FOR IRAQIS, TREATMENT FOR TRAUMA IS LUXURY

By Rebecca Murray

BEIRUT, Jan 18 (IPS) - The young woman was walking with her husband along a Baghdad street when she was abducted, held captive and raped repeatedly by five militia men for several days.

"Before, she was very proud of her body but now she is overweight -- she eats to protect herself and not to attract people," says therapist Sana Hamzeh about her 27-year-old Iraqi patient, who recently escaped to Lebanon as a refugee.

"When she first came here she hated her body and was very isolated. She could not touch her husband. She sat rigidly, clenched; she could not relax or talk about her feelings."

Hamzeh works at the recently opened Restart centre in Beirut, a charity funded by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCR) that provides free therapy and psychological therapy rehabilitation for up to 70 mostly Iraqi refugees who are victims of torture. The centre also gathers documentation to help argue their case for asylum.

The centre is a brief respite for a few Iraqis fleeing torture, death sentences and the grinding violence of daily life back home. But they arrive in Lebanon only to find themselves dangerously illegal, and subject to discrimination and exploitation. Few can find counselling and support.

"We have many challenges," project director Suzanne Jabbour tells IPS. "First, people are afraid to get psychological help because it's not normal in Lebanese, or Iraqi culture. Second, we need to learn about Iraqi culture, history and traditions to deal with people. The third challenge is that Iraqis are treated inhumanely here. Most have low self-esteem, and because they don't know how things work, they can't adapt quickly."

The UNHCR conservatively estimates that 2.2 million people have left Iraq since 2003, the majority to Syria and Jordan. A recent Danish Refugee Council (DRC) survey found around 50,000 Iraqis in Lebanon; half of them Shia, the rest Christian and Sunni. Nearly 80 percent of the refugees entered the country illegally, while many of the rest overstayed their short-term tourist visas.

Lebanon is not considered a final resettlement destination, but the UNHCR faces a huge challenge moving the refugees to permanent home countries. "There were only 600 accepted from Lebanon for resettlement last year," says agency spokeswoman Laure Chedrawi. "This is less than one percent, which is a very, very small number of Iraqis. There are few resettlement countries and they have a lot of criteria, so we are now prioritising only the most vulnerable cases."

Since Lebanon is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention, refugees are afforded little protection with UNHCR-issued identification, and are prey to what Human Rights Watch calls "the whim of the law enforcement officer at the checkpoint." Those arrested are sent back to Iraq after they serve out prison sentences alongside criminals, or detained indefinitely if they refuse to go home. These hard realities contribute to the UN agency's low registration of 10,000 refugees, and to the isolation of the rest.

(SNIP)

The DRC found that most Iraqis here eke out a living as labourers, making tea in offices or as building guards for an average monthly household salary just over the 200 dollars minimum wage. They lack the most basic access to health care, and only a little over half of the children attend the over-crowded Lebanese school system. However, DRC says that for most refugees "returning to Iraq despite the hazards (here) is considered a last resort."

Restart's goal this coming year is to reach out to those suffering torture or trauma from the 40,000 Iraqis not registered with UNHCR. "We want to open community-based rehabilitation centres because not all refugees can travel to our office here," explains Jabbour. "We will train charities, health professionals and lawyers on how to work with refugees, and how to document the legal, physical and psychological aspects of torture."

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Copyright 2008, Gloria R. Lalumia

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