RELENTLESS

<br />Relentless Teaser <i>by Clammag</i>

Teaser du film avec Nneka, Jimmy Jean-Louis, Gideon Okeke;

Réalisé par Andy Amadi Okoroafor.

 

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Fellows Friday with

Andy Amadi Okoroafor

Andy Amadi Okoroafor, founder of creative studio Clam, loves to use imagery in different ways, from fashion to film. Here, he reveals how shortwave radio influences his work – including his internationally successful Clam Magazine — and his latest scheme to make social entrepreneurs sexy.

Interactive Fellows Friday Feature!
Join the conversation by answering Fellows’ weekly questions via Facebook. This week, Andy asks:

How do you think we can make social entrepreneurs sexy?

Click here to respond!

We’ve seen design, films, magazines, and so much more come from Clam. Tell us about Clam.

Clam is about images: it’s a venue to think about images, develop images, and also to make a living from doing images — I’m passionate about images.

At the Clam studio we mostly do image development for people. I develop image concepts for clients, graphic design and, of course, advertisements. We also do books, cards, exhibitions, image-related events and even private concerts – anything to do with images. That’s the commercial arm of Clam.

Two times a year we publish the magazine Clam, which has been my curse and my happiness. It’s my curse because it’s become so popular, people think that’s what I do. I’ve been doing it for 10 years and people think I just do magazines, but I really just do it twice a year.

Clam Magazine is published in Japan, the US, Europe, and Brazil. It’s a visual magazine with an interesting mix of people in it. It’s also in different languages. This is our 11th year of doing the Clam magazine. It has become famous, but it’s not a commercial magazine: we don’t allow too many advertisements in the magazine (though we do try to get sponsorship sometimes).

The idea for the magazine was just to talk about what we really like. We do it because we like to do it. We don’t do trends. If we became trendy, we’d just phase out. We don’t talk about fashion shows, new gadgets to have, etc. But I guess it’s still a fashion magazine, in a way, because it’s actually a magazine about creativity, presented visually. It’s also about social entrepreneurship, innovation, and a whole lot more, but it’s done from a very humane point of view.

What led you to your current career path?

My biggest work experiences have been in music, fashion and visual communication, even though I studied cinema. After working in fashion for years I was headhunted to Virgin France. I spent 5 years art directing music videos. I did their imagery, from the album covers to music video. Then I left to go develop my first feature film, Relentless. I am happy to be back in cinema.

 
In October, Relentless was selected for the London film festival, and on December 6^thRelentless was shown for the first time in Africa, at the African International Film Festival in Port Harcourt. It was exciting for me to see the four screens packed and people begging to come in to see my film, in my country. Clam produced and raised the financing of the film. It’s a big deal for a small company like us.

What’s next for Clam?

I want to meet TED Fellows who are into films, fashion and creativity in Asia, because I want to do my next film in Asia. I’m especially into Korea and Japan: I know Seoul and have been there a lot. One of the reasons I wrote the story was because of Seoul. I also want to talk more about Asia in Clam Magazine: more about India, Malaysia, Indonesia … Lebanon rocks, too … etc.

People who meet me are always surprised I’m the one doing the magazine. It doesn’t fit the aesthetics cliché of what an African doing imagery “should” be doing. But I’m African, Nigerian….but my work has a world view.

I like the fact that my magazine is sold next to the French Vogue in New York City. The fact that the distributors do think the two are kind of related makes me laugh … but it’s what Clam is all about. My work is multicultural. Our concept is, “local everywhere.” That’s Clam’s tagline.
How has your background influenced your work?

It has influenced me in a lot of ways. I was one year old when the war started in Biafra. So it has a lot of influence on my psyche, about what I think about life.

The logo of Clam was done in my village. The logo and the whole concept of Clam were done in my village on my dad’s balcony in between shortwave radio programs.

What has influenced me the most is shortwave radio: it’s about changing dials. I’m going to give you a little secret about shortwave radio and my work: if you go one millimeter, you go from Russia to Afghanistan. You move very fast in a very short space. You change influences, you change imagery, you change sound … so if you translate that to imagery, that’s what I do. You can read Clam from back to front or front to back – that’s how it works. You can dial forward, dial back to get to any point. My process on imagery is based on that: shortwave radio. That’s why my magazine looks the way it looks. I even tried this concept on my film Relentless.

I watch a lot of Korean films and they have influenced me a great deal. Film-wise, Wong Kar-wai, Im Sang-soo and Shohei Imamura are people who influenced me a lot, and of course Jean-Luc Godard. I moved to Paris in 1986 to study cinema because of Godard. (I didn’t know he was Swiss). People like John Paul Goude, Helmut Newton and Harry Peccinotti are my other visual influences.

But I think the biggest influence of my life is sitting on my parents’ balcony in the village and listening to shortwave radio.
How has the TED Fellowship influenced you?

I found like-minded people at TED and it reinforced what I already believed. I found a certain kind of connection to a certain kind of mind-state, a certain attitude and life-view that I like very much.

I have an ambition about what I want to do with TED. This is an influence TED had on me, and it’s also a challenge to the TED community: I want to make social entrepreneurs sexy. I want people to look at them the way they look at a rock star or a movie star.

My challenge right now is, the way I would work with a musician, a product, or film, I want to do the same with social entrepreneurs. I want Clam to become the destination for social entrepreneurs to develop their imagery. That’s something I really believe in. Because I think social entrepreneurs are the new artists – I wrote that in the new editorial of Clam. Before, Clam Magazine didn’t have social entrepreneurs. I’ve started putting them in because of TED. I am even doing the new Clam website with Apurv Mishra, a Ted Fellow … we are trying something crazy….

Sometimes kids with problems with school or social life use their frustration to learn to play the guitar, start a band, or DJ in clubs. If their stuff works, voila, all of a sudden they’re the cool kid. I think the way music becomes people’s escape, social entrepreneurship — if it works on its strengths — can become a positive escape for a lot of youths in the world. It gives them an outlet for their energy, something to dedicate themselves to, and it’s a form of expression. That’s really my belief.

I want to work on social entrepreneurs to be that cool. That’s the whole idea behind it. If young people become that impressed with social entrepreneurs, they will follow them and want to go out and work for Amnesty International, Samarsource or Ushindi, they’ll want to be TED Fellows, because it is the cool thing to do. Not only because it is the right thing, but because it’s actually the cool thing to do.  Make the right thing cool!

That’s basically my idea.

For me, social entrepreneurs are the new rock stars, and that’s what Clam wants to develop. Some areas of social entrepreneurship are already seen as sexy, but some need more help. And we can enhance that….and you don’t need crocodile pants or a fake swagger or a drug habit …helping raise funds for a project in the DRC should be as cool as writing a great song after your girlfriend left you…that’s the crazy point I am trying to make! If we get that across to young people, the world will share more and we will care for each other more.

Being at TED has helped me so much to legitimize that thought.

There are many aspiring social entrepreneurs out there who are trying to take their passion and ideas to the next level. What is one piece of advice you would give to them based on your own experiences and successes? Learn more about how to become a great social entrepreneur from all of the TED Fellows on the Case Foundation blog.

My advice for social entrepreneurs is to know that they are the most interesting thing happening in the world right now. They shouldn’t be buried in their computers, you know? They are changing the world; they should also live in the world they are changing.

Social entrepreneurs are the most remarkable people right now on any level, whether in music, art, business … for me they are the coolest thing. But I think there’s a reticence about expressing that you’re doing good. It’s hard to say “Hey, I’ve done this and that and I’m helping people build schools and hospitals.” What’s cooler than that? Designing a new collection, a sofa, a car, a hotel, becoming the new Banksy? Nah, nothing comes close!

The world has made social entrepreneurs seem unimportant, but this is actually what is important right now. This is what young people want to be into. Its just the gates seem closed … you think you can’t make out in that crowd. That’s why something like TED becomes so important. It’s cool to be a TED Fellow.
Social entrepreneurs should blow their own horn a bit more.

It sounds like you are always working on a million ideas at once. What do you do to relax and get away from work?

I don’t see life that way, because for me work and play are mixed. I enjoy what I do, I do what I enjoy, mostly. When I’m on a film set, I don’t think of it as being at work.

I like music a lot. I go to the movies, I travel a lot. I just enjoy life when I’m doing this. I don’t have that, “this is work, and this is play” mentality. I don’t drink, I don’t smoke, I don’t do drugs, so I don’t have that  kind of split in my life. Ah, I am sounding too good! I have my bad parts too, please … things are mixed.

I don’t have ideas all the time. Sometimes I have no ideas, but I still do the same thing. [Laughs]. I don’t have ideas all the time. You met me on a good day.

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BANTU feat. NNEKA "I am waiting"

from Relentless soundtrack

by Andy Amadi Okoroafor

>via: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJGjAKAbB5g

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Emory University’s

Édouard Glissant Tribute

Emory University’s Department of French and Italian is hosting The Édouard Glissant Tribute, a celebration of the life and work of one of the most important Caribbean intellectuals whose thought has been an influence for post-colonial theory, world literature, cultural and literary theory, and philosophies of race and difference.

The Édouard Glissant Tribute will include a screening of the recent documentary Édouard Glissant: One World in Relation (2009, directed by Manthia Diawara) followed by a roundtable with Professor Bernadette Cailler, hosted by Professor Valérie Loichot. A reception will follow.

The tribute will take place on Thursday, November 3, 2011, from 6:30pm until 8:30pm at White Hall 206, Emory University, in Atlanta, Georgia. It is part of the activities of Comparative Caribbeans: an Interdisciplinary Conference, which takes place November 3-5, 2011, featuring keynote speakers Guillermina De Ferrari (University of Wisconsin-Madison), Natalie Melas (Cornell University), Mara Negrón (University of Puerto Rico-Río Piedras), and Rubén Ríos Ávila (University of Puerto Rico-Río Piedras). [See previous posts Call for Papers: Comparative Caribbeans, An Interdisciplinary Conference and Deadline Extended: Comparative Caribbeans: An Interdisciplinary Conference.]

For more information, see https://blogs.emory.edu/graduatestudentcouncil/category/2011-2012-events/gsc-co-sponsored-events/

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Hispanic Heritage

Month at the BFC/A:

Focus on Sara Gómez

Today marks the first day of Hispanic Heritage Month, and the BFC/A is honoring Afro-Cuban filmmaker Sara Gómez.  Gomez made numerous short documentaries and newsreels for ICAIC, the Cuban national film institute, but is primarily known for her feature film De Cierta Manera (One Way or Another).

courtesy: afrocubaweb.com

 

Here is the list of films we will feature:

Monday, September 19 at 7:00 pm

De Cierta Manera (One Way or Another), dir: Sara Gómez, 1974

Location: Monroe County Public Library Auditorium

This screening is co-sponsored by CUBAmistad.

 

Friday, September 30 at 2:00 pm

A Selection of Documentary Shorts by Sara Gómez

Location: Black Film Center/Archive

 

Friday, October 7 at 2:00 pm

¿Donde està Sara Gómez? (Where is Sara Gómez), dir: Alessandra Müller, 2005

Location: Black Film Center/Archive

** All screenings are free and open to the public and will be followed by discussions.**

 

>via: http://blackfilmcenterarchive.wordpress.com/2011/09/15/hispanic-heritage-mont...

 

 

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Forthcoming Symposium:

 

“Puerto Rican Studies

 

for a New Century”

 

President of the Puerto Rican Studies Association (PRSA) Roberto Márquez (William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, Mount Holyoke College) announces the inaugural annual membership meeting of the association, in conjunction with a one day symposium organized around the theme “Puerto Rican Studies for a New Century: Challenges, Prospects and Possibilities.” With featured speakers Edna Acosta-Belén, Juan Flores, and Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes, the symposium will be held on Saturday, October 29, 2011, from 10:00am to 2:00pm, in Assembly Room 615W, at Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY), 68th Street and Lexington Avenue, New York City.

Edna Acosta-Belén is Distinguished Service Professor of Latin American, Caribbean, U.S. Latino and Woman’s Studies at the University at Albany, SUNY, where she has served as Director of its Center for Latino, Latin American and Caribbean Studies. She is co-founder and editor of the Latin(a) ResearchReview and author of works such as Puerto Ricans in the United States: A Contemporary Portrait (with Carlos Santiago) and Researching Women in Latin America and the Caribbean (with Christine Bose).  

Juan Flores is professor of social and cultural analysis in the Latino Studies Division of the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis at New York University. Winner of the prestigious international Casa de Las Americas Prize for Insularismo e ideología burguesa (1980), he was also the recipient, in 2009, of its Premio Extraordinario de Estudios sobre los Latinos en Estados Unidos for his collection Bugalú y otros guisos: ensayos sobre culturas Latinas en Estados Unidos. His other publications include Divided Borders: Essays on Puerto Rican Identity(1980), From Bomba to Hip-Hop: Puerto Rican Culture and Latin Identity (2000), A Companion to Latina/o Studies (2007), and The Diaspora Strikes Back (2009).

Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes is associate professor of Spanish at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. Writer, poet, playwright, and performer, he is the author of Queer Ricans: Cultures and Sexualities in the Diaspora (2009) and a collection of short stories, Uñas pintandas de azul/Blue Fingernails (2009).

To pre-register for this event, go to http://prsa2011symposium.eventbrite.com/

For more information on this event and other PRSA activities, seehttp://www.puertoricanstudies.org/

[Image: Antonio Martorell’s 2001 “Homenaje a Magritte (Esto no es una Marina)”]

>via: http://repeatingislands.com/2011/09/20/forthcoming-symposium-“puerto-rican-studies-for-a-new-century”/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why it took 11 months

instead of three weeks

to show that Haiti’s cholera

is Nepalese

September 25, 2011

A tale of noble and ignoble scientists, Harvard and the U.N.

Mis à jour avec traduction française

by Dady Chery

A Haitian resident holds his relative who is suffering from cholera at St-Catherine hospital in the slum of Cite-Soleil in Port-au-Prince Nov. 12, 2010. (Un résident d’Haïti tient son parent qui souffre de choléra à l’hôpital Sainte-Catherine dans le bidonville de Cité-Soleil, à Port-au-Prince Novembre 12, 2010.) - Photo: St-Felix Evens, Reuters

It took nearly a year since the start of Haiti’s cholera epidemic for scientists to get conclusive proof that the cholera bacteria in Haiti are identical to bacteria in Nepal. Drs. Frank Aarestrup from Denmark, Paul Keim from Arizona and Geeta Shakya from Kathmandu led a recent study that provided this evidence.

The DNA in cholera changes rapidly when these bacteria infect humans. This makes the cholera a moving target and very difficult to vaccinate against. On the other hand, when two cholera turn out to be identical, one can say with confidence that they originated from the same place or infected person(s).

By comparing the complete DNA sequences (also called “genomes”) from the cholera in Haiti to the complete DNA sequences from cholera in Nepal, the international group of scientists found that Haiti’s cholera exactly matches one of four Nepalese cholera. The resemblance between the Haitian and Nepalese cholera was so strong that, in a sequence of about 4,000,000 DNA bases, all agreed except for one or two. This is as good as comparing one complete volume of Shakespeare’s works to a new tome from a different publisher, discovering that there are no more than one or two single-letter differences between them, and concluding that both are indeed the complete Shakespeare. The techniques for this type of study are enormously expensive but very quick and not especially demanding.

DNA double helix sequence (Séquence de l’ADN en double hélice)

One could reasonably ask if it is necessary to compare every letter in two volumes of Shakespeare to decide that they are the same. Why not scan, for example, through the section headings for the same sequences of acts in the plays and the same succession of sonnets? Indeed there exist older and cheaper techniques for examining DNA that do something of the sort. This is how the Center for Disease Control (CDC) found that the cholera strain in Haiti is Vibrio Cholerae O1 Ogawa Biotype El Tor. It is also how the CDC discovered that every Haitian who got cholera had the identical bacteria, which was taken to mean that the Haitian epidemic had a single source.

If expense was an issue for the CDC, it certainly was not for the groups that favor the current technology. According to the latter, two cholera-sized “books” can be scanned at “single-letter” resolution over 30 times in less than 24 hours.

So why did it take 11 months to nail the source of Haiti’s cholera? The only reason it took so long to discover that Haiti’s cholera came from Nepal is because scientists had until now not bothered to compare the cholera from Haiti to cholera from Nepal.

The only reason it took so long to discover that Haiti’s cholera came from Nepal is because scientists had until now not bothered to compare the cholera from Haiti to cholera from Nepal.

Back when a precise knowledge of the source of the epidemic would have saved lives and probably aborted the renewal of the U.N. (MINUSTAH) mandate in Haiti, John Mekalanos’ group at Harvard promised to carry out the study that was finally done by Aarestrup, Keim and Shakya. Mekalanos argued that the conclusive proof of the origin of any cholera could only come from studies using the most modern methods. Other scientists deferred to Harvard, first because, well, it was Harvard, and second, because they could not afford the new technology. Instead of doing a proper study, however, Mekalanos’ group compared the DNA of the cholera from Haiti to the DNA of three types of cholera from different epidemics. Not a single one was from Nepal.

In the end the Harvard group published an article in which the word “Nepal” did not appear even once. The cholera they used were from an epidemic in Peru and two different epidemics in Bangladesh. They merely concluded that the cholera in Haiti is Asian: a fact that was already known from the CDC studies.

Dr. Mekalanos had this to say during an interview with Science Watch in February 2011:

“My colleagues and I have been very clear in saying that the genomic evidence says that this strain in Haiti has its origin in South Asia. True, Nepal is part of South Asia so it clearly needs more investigation and a commission has been established by the U.N. to look into the possibility.”

The Vibrio Cholerae O1 Ogawa Biotype El Tor bacteria has been identified as the single source of cholera in Haiti. (Le Vibrio cholerae O1 Ogawa biotype El Tor bactérie identifié comme la source unique du choléra en Haïti.) – Photo: Dartmouth College

Without exaggerating, one might say, for example, that the cholera study by Harvard was analogous to using the most sensitive instruments and best-trained scientists to test for Fukushima radiation everywhere in the globe except Japan, reporting that the meltdowns had probably happened somewhere in Asia, and then proposing that a commission from the nuclear-power companies finish the investigation.

Unlike the Harvard group, the Denmark and Arizona scientists collaborated with Katmandhu researchers who gave them access to cholera samples collected from 24 patients in five Nepalese districts between July 30 and Nov. 1, 2010. Given that the Nepalese government has violently protested all mentions of any association with the epidemic, the Nepalese scientists who participated in this project did so at considerable personal risk. It made sense to look in Nepal for a possible source for Haiti’s cholera, because U.N. troops arrived fresh from the cholera epidemics in Nepal days before the first Haitian case of the disease was diagnosed.

The fact that the Harvard group discovered nothing much about Haiti’s cholera did not prevent them from admonishing Haitians to be immediately vaccinated. They did so although cholera vaccines are not recommended by the Word Health Organization (WHO) even to tourists entering areas with endemic cholera. Such vaccines are considered worse than useless because they give the illusion of protection and encourage reckless behavior. Since the cholera change rapidly, vaccination lasts for only about six months even against the cholera strains for which the vaccines are made. Moreover, the vaccines give zero protection against other cholera strains.

But here is what Mekalanos’ colleague Dr. Matthew Waldor said:

“It’s time to seriously consider vaccinating people who live in Haiti and the Dominican Republic, not only to save lives there, but to prevent the spread of this new strain to other countries in the region.”

Science, universities, corporations and profits

I was so impressed by this enthusiasm for vaccines that I decided to look into the list of disclosures that the Harvard scientists had to file for their publication. I discovered the following:

Several of the Harvard scientists own stock in Pacific Biosciences, a company that makes the machines and all the supplies for the expensive new method of DNA sequencing that they had been promoting. One person on the project was employed by Pacific Biosciences. One could say, in a way, that the Haiti cholera study was an advertisement for PB’s products.

Dr. John Mekalanos and his corporate interests

Dr. Mekalanos is involved in cholera-vaccine development. He and Harvard University receive royalties from Vaccines Technologies Inc., a company that entered an exclusive license and development agreement with Celldex Therapeutics Inc.(formerly AVANT Immunotherapeutics, Inc.) in January 2009. The agreement allows VTI to develop and commercialize Celldex’s CholeraGarde(R) vaccine program.

He is co-founder of three biotechnology firms, Virus Research Institute, PharmAthene and, most recently, Matrivax. Virus Research Institute later merged with another company and became Avant Immunotherapeutics, a firm that receives grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Harvard’s Haiti cholera study can be seen as an advertisement for Pacific Biosciences, where some of the researchers owned stock. The photo shows off Pacific Sciences’ $700 million DNA sequencing machine. According to Shareholder.com, their 2011 second quarter revenues totaled $10.6 million and gross profit, $7.9 million. Working on the machine is the company’s founder, Stephen Turner, in laser-resistant glasses. (L’étude du choléra d’Haïti à Harvard peut être considérée comme une publicité pour Pacific Biosciences, où certains des chercheurs tiennent du stock. Cette photo montre une machine de séquençage d’ADN de Pacific Biosciences qui coute 700 millions de dollars. Leurs affaires du 2ème trimestre 2011 s’élèvent à 10.6 millions de dollars et le bénéfice brut, 7.9 millions de dollars.) – Photo: Gregg Segal, Bloomberg Businessweek

Mekalanos’ PharmAthene is a biodefense company involved with the development and commercialization of medical countermeasures against biological and chemical weapons. Their customers included the U.S. Defense Department, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority and the U.S. National Institutes of Health. For the second quarter of 2011 PharmAthene saw revenues of $6.4 million compared to $4.8 million the same period of 2010: an increase of $1.6 million. His company’s SparVax program totaled $5.3 million for the three months ending June 30, 2011, compared to $2.1 million for the same period in 2010.

 

Mekalanos’ third company, Matrivax Research & Development Corp. in Boston, is a small private corporation with only eight employees that received an annual revenue of $710,000 last year, shared by Mekalanos, his two partners and employees. He is director of Matrivax, which is privately funded, including grants from the Bill Gates Foundation.

Mekalanos is also the founder of Virus Research and Versicor. Versicor is at least a multi-million dollar corporation, gaining $22 million in investments in 1997 alone. That same year, they targeted “the substantial worldwide medical need for antibiotics as evidenced by the current market size, which currently exceeds $23 billion.” The company “gained access to proprietary technology for the identification of novel drug targets in bacteria from the laboratory of Professor John Mekalanos, chairman of the Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics.”

According to his executive profile in Bloomsberg Businessweek, information on Mekalanos’ annual income, stock options and total compensation is not available.

Mekalanos has not let any conflict of interest stop him from flogging his vaccine:

“When I heard in January 2010 that an earthquake had hit Haiti, the first thing that crossed my mind was ‘how long?’ I knew cholera would happen sooner or later; the only question was when.

“Why wasn’t it stockpiled? You’ll never stockpile this vaccine without a few global health organizations saying it makes sense to do so. And the obvious organization, the one which stands right in the cross hairs, is the WHO. It takes courage to make that statement and stand by it.

“By way of full disclosure, I have been involved in developing cholera vaccines, so you might say I’m conflicted. However, others have made cholera vaccines too. The problem has not been as much making a safe and effective vaccine. It is getting agencies to say they are willing to use it as part of public policy. After that, I’m sure we can figure out how to get that global stockpile made.”

The idea that earthquakes cause cholera is patently absurd. Earthquakes cannot create cholera. Cholera may be released from sewage into drinking water during earthquakes, but this can only happen in places where the cholera already exists in the sewage.

There is no evidence that cholera has ever existed in Haiti before October 2010. The cholera first appeared explosively in the Artibonite region: a rural area that had suffered no damage from the earthquake. By contrast, in Port-au-Prince, where the earthquake damage was massive, the incidence of cholera was five times lower than in the Artibonite.

Interestingly, the most enthusiastic support for Harvard’s efforts to vaccinate Haitians has come from none other than U.N. Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) director Dr. John Andrus.

“I see a real opportunity to vaccinate vulnerable groups in countries that have yet to see the outbreak but we know would be very vulnerable if cholera was imported …. I worry about some of the poorer countries of the Caribbean. I worry about Central America.”

Andrus’ first action during the epidemic was to give a press conference. There he announced that one should expect many thousands of Haitians to die of cholera, and he pleaded for donations of $164 million to the U.N. and a group of 42 NGOs that he had quickly gathered under PAHO’s umbrella.

Several times former President Preval’s government came under strong pressure from the U.N. to vaccinate the Haitian population, and every time the Haitian Ministry of Public Health refused. If the ministry had acquiesced to the vaccination campaigns, the U.N., via PAHO, would have purchased massive doses of the Mekalanos vaccine. Harvard and corporate affiliates would have made tidy profits.

It is worthwhile to note that the source of Haiti’s cholera was identified, not by U.S. or European researchers many months after the epidemic but by Haitians at home and in the diaspora within days of the first cases of cholera. In an article in Axis of Logic, I argued that the epidemic had been introduced into Haiti by the U.N. Soon thereafter, Mirebalais’ mayor and other citizens brought to the press’ attention their observation that the epidemic had started downstream of the U.N. base of Nepalese soldiers in the nearby village of Meille in the Artibonite region.

A more formal epidemiological study led by Dr. Renaud Piarroux confirmed and strengthened this summer the initial observations. Two Haitians contributed to the study as authors, Dr. Robert Barrais, who is an epidemiologist in Haiti’s National Laboratory of Public Health, and Dr. Roc Magloire, who is the director of this institution. Other Haitian epidemiologists and medical authorities declined to be co-authors of the paper because of concerns about retaliation.

Importantly, Piarroux’s team in France and Haiti concluded that there must have been active cases of cholera among the Nepalese MINUSTAH troops last October for the dose of cholera in the Artibonite river water to have been lethal.

“To our knowledge, only infectious doses over 10,000 bacteria were shown to produce mild patent infection in healthy volunteers, and higher doses are required to provoke severe infections. Reaching such doses in the Meille River is hardly compatible with the amount of bacteria excreted by asymptomatic carriers, whereas if one or several arriving soldiers were incubating the disease, they would have subsequently excreted diarrheal stools containing 10 billion to 10 trillion bacteria per liter. We therefore believe that symptomatic cases occurred inside the MINUSTAH camp.”

This implies a coverup by the U.N., which continues to claim that none of its troops was ever ill with cholera.

At least six scientific studies have resulted from the Haitian cholera epidemic, though only two have yielded results of any consequence. Every one of these studies has dismissed the discoveries by Haitians as mere “rumor,” although it was these findings, together with Haitian and Cuban record keeping, that made possible the epidemiological study by the French. If Haitians had not identified the source of the cholera, it might never have been discovered; instead, the epidemic would have been blamed on the supposed bad hygiene of the poor, and the U.N. and NGOs would have exploited the epidemic as yet another occasion to enrich themselves from the misfortune of Haitians.

The U.N. continues to claim that none of its troops was ever ill with cholera. If Haitians had not identified the source of the cholera, it might never have been discovered; instead, the epidemic would have been blamed on the supposed bad hygiene of the poor, and the U.N. and NGOs would have exploited the epidemic as yet another occasion to enrich themselves from the misfortune of Haitians.

Surprisingly the French study provided no explanation for the fact that the cholera managed to reach the off-shore island of La Gonâve, and it accepted as fact the government explanation that the prisoners who died of cholera had been given river water to drink. Actually the cholera initially spread much too rapidly throughout the country to be explained by anything but a widespread distribution of the bacteria in infected bottled water.

After I pointed this out early in the epidemic, the Haitian government discontinued the “dlo nan sachèt” (water in plastic bags) that were being distributed as “purified water” throughout the country. Discontinuing this distribution of infected water probably saved lives.

Piarroux stopped short of suggesting that some means of distribution of highly infected water was involved in the epidemic. He did say, however, that he could not explain the mechanism by which people were lethally infected well downstream of the Meille tributary of the Artibonite, when the river water, moving at more than 100 cubic meters per second, should have rapidly diluted the cholera to non-lethal doses.

Certainly one of the most important lessons from the earthquake and cholera epidemic is that Haitians can be each other’s salvation. During the first days of the epidemic, when scientific investigations of its origin mattered most, there were no plans for a thorough epidemiological study nor a comparison of the DNA of the cholera in Haiti to those from Nepal. It took the international scientific community nearly a year to do its job, and at every step it had to be shamed into it by Haitians determined to help each other.

It took the international scientific community nearly a year to do its job, and at every step it had to be shamed into it by Haitians determined to help each other.

The proof that the U.N. brought the cholera epidemic into Haiti has come much too late, but perhaps some use can be derived from it apart from publications and accolades for Western researchers. When the U.N. Security Council next considers MINUSTAH’s mandate in mid-October of this year, Drs. Renaud Piarroux, Frank Aarestrup and Paul Keim should stand up and explain why MINUSTAH troops must be immediately removed from Haiti so as to prevent new epidemics. The scientists should additionally propose that MINUSTAH countries make reparations for polluting Haiti’s rivers and aquifers.

The scientists should additionally propose that MINUSTAH countries make reparations for polluting Haiti’s rivers and aquifers.

Instead of promoting useless vaccines to Haitians, the U.N. should compensate the families of cholera victims and finance the construction of sewage- and water-treatment plants throughout the country using Haitian labor for this enterprise at every level.

Dady Chery grew up at the heart of an extended working-class family in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. She emigrated to New York when she was 14 and since then has traveled throughout the world, living in Europe and several North American cities. She writes in English, French and her native Créole and holds a doctorate. She can be reached at dc@dadychery.org. This story first appeared in Axis of Logic, where Chery is a columnist.

__________________________

Mourning, outrage, disbelief

over woman's mutilation

in Syria

By Salma Abdelaziz, CNN

September 26, 2011 -- Updated 1701 GMT (0101 HKT)

Zainab Alhusni, 19, turned up beheaded and dismembered after Syrian security forces whisked her away.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• "They killed the rose Zainab," protesters' placards say
• Zainab Alhusni's death is called "appalling" by the United Nations
• The woman was seized to get at her brother, many say

 

 

(CNN) -- A young woman whisked away by Syrian security forces to coax the surrender of her activist brother turned up beheaded and dismembered, activists and human rights groups say, yet another high-profile display of cruelty in the conflict-wracked nation.

Nineteen-year-old Zainab Alhusni stepped away from her Homs residence last month to buy groceries.

Her family never saw her again until security forces returned her mutilated corpse, two opposition activist groups operating inside Syria and Amnesty International told CNN.

As reports of the torture sparked outrage across Homs and the rest of the world, amateur video surfaced of dozens of woman protesting the death.

"They killed the rose Zainab," their placards said.

"If it is confirmed that Zainab was in custody when she died, this would be one of the most disturbing cases of a death in detention we have seen so far," said Philip Luther, Amnesty's deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa.

The case also drew the antipathy of the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, which characterized the incident as "appalling" and as one example of the "targeting and attacking of families and sympathizers of the protesters by security forces."

The ferocious Syrian government crackdown against dissenters began in mid-March when anti-government protests unfolded. The number of people killed over the past six months has reached at least 2,700, according to the U.N. human rights office. Some activist groups put the toll at around 3,000.

Zainab's brother Mohammed Alhusni -- a prominent opposition activist praised by colleagues for leading anti-government protests and treating the wounded -- had been evading authorities for weeks when his sister disappeared, said the Homs Quarters Union, an activist group.

"The secret police kidnapped Zainab so they could threaten her brother and pressure him to turn himself in to the authorities. The government often uses this tactic to get to activists," a union media coordinator told CNN.

The Local Coordination Committees of Syria, an activist group, said security forces called Zainab's family to trade her "freedom for her pro-democracy activist brother's surrender," LCC said.

Mohammed Alhusni was eventually slain on September 10, when security forces fired on demonstrators in Homs.

When the family retrieved Mohammed's body from a Homs military hospital, medical officials told relatives about another unclaimed body with the label "Zainab Alhusni" that had been kept in a hospital freezer for some time.

Days later, Zainab's family received the woman's headless and limbless corpse, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, Amnesty International and the Homs Quarters Union said.

The Homs Quarters Union provided a video to CNN showing the pale trunk of a female body beside a detached head with long black hair among dismembered limbs.

Authorities forced Zainab's mother to sign a document saying both Zainab and Mohammad had been kidnapped and killed by an armed gang, Amnesty International said in an online statement.

Syrian authorities could not be reached for comment on the Alhusni case. The Syrian government has maintained that armed gangs with foreign agendas, not the regime, are responsible for the violence that has plagued the Arab country for months.

CNN cannot independently verify the authenticity of the video, the claims, or the death toll because the government has repeatedly denied requests for journalists to report inside Syria.

Mutilated woman, slain brother become symbols of Syria’s pain

September 27, 2011 ⋅ 6:29 am ⋅ Post a comment

Filed Under  Assad, brutal crackdown, Mutilated woman, Syria, Zainab Alhusni

By: Salma Abdelaziz, CNN

Zainab Alhusni was a simple seamstress in Syria, well-loved by all her neighbors and friends. Now, in a tragic turn of events, she has become a symbol of the cruelty gripping that conflict-wracked nation.

Alhusni was only 18 when she stepped away from her Homs residence last month to buy groceries. Her family never again saw her alive. She was whisked away by Syrian security forces to coax the surrender of her activist brother, and ended up beheaded and dismembered, a neighbor, activists and human rights groups say.

Waleed Fares, a neighbor and family friend, told CNN on Monday that Zainab’s father died when she was just a toddler, leaving her mother and three siblings to fend for themselves in a country with often-unfavorable conditions for a single mother. All four children dropped out of school at a young age so they could work as laborers to provide for their family, Fares said.

Zainab dreamed of owning her own tailor shop, so she could support her impoverished family, he said. But she never had a chance to fulfill that dream.

Her older brother, Mohammed, became a well-known activist in the family’s hometown of Homs in western Syria, often leading the demonstrations against embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and treating the wounded.

“Protesters would carry Mohammed on their shoulders so he could lead the chants,” Fares said. “He was very loved by everyone. The protesters even had a chant they would say for him, using his nickname: ‘Abu Ahmed, may Allah protect you!’”

Security forces pursued Mohammed Alhusni for months, raiding his family’s home several times, causing the family to flee to a nearby neighborhood on July 25, Fares said.

On July 27, Zainab Alhusni disappeared, leaving her family devastated and her siblings panicked and anxious, the neighbor said.

“If it had been her brother it would have been different. Taking Zainab, it became a matter of family honor and family pride. Her mother was beyond depressed. She seemed to be between life and death,” Fares said.

Neighbors and family friends called on each other to collect donations to ease the family’s financial troubles, but this became the least of the Alhusni family’s concerns.

Several days after Zainab disappeared, security forces called the family and offered to meet them in a pro-Assad neighborhood where they would trade Zainab for her activist brother.

“The family did not trust the security forces. They would not even confirm to them that Zainab was alive, and they all believed it was a trap to take Mohammed, too,” Fares said.

On September 10, the family says, Mohammed was wounded in a demonstration. He came back to his loved ones a corpse. The family believes he was tortured to death.

In a statement posted to YouTube, another brother, Yousif Alhusni, describes multiple gunshot wounds to Mohammed’s chest and a single shot through his mouth.

“His arms were broken and there were cigarette burns to his face,” he adds.

The family went to collect Mohammed’s body from a hospital when doctors told them another unclaimed body with the label “Zainab Alhusni” had been kept in the morgue’s freezer for some time.

When the family received the body, her head and arms had been chopped off. Chunks of her flesh were charred, appearing in places to have been melted or burned down to the bone.

Authorities forced Zainab’s mother to sign a document saying both her daughter and her son had been kidnapped and killed by an armed gang, Amnesty International said in an online statement

“If it is confirmed that Zainab was in custody when she died, this would be one of the most disturbing cases of a death in detention we have seen so far,” said Philip Luther, Amnesty International’s deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa.

The case also drew the antipathy of the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, which characterized the incident as “appalling” and an example of the “targeting and attacking of families and sympathizers of the protesters by security forces.”

The ferocious Syrian government crackdown against dissenters began in mid-March when anti-government protests unfolded. The number of people killed over the past six months has reached at least 2,700, according to the U.N. human rights office. Some activist groups put the toll at around 3,000.

Syrian authorities could not be reached for comment on the Alhusni case. The Syrian government has maintained armed gangs with foreign agendas, not the regime, are responsible for the violence that has plagued the Arab country for months.

CNN cannot independently verify the authenticity of the video, the claims, or the death toll because the government has repeatedly denied requests for journalists to report inside Syria.

“Perhaps more than any other family they were chosen to be at the front lines of the Syrian revolution,” Fares said of the Alhusni family. “They were very poor, so they felt the brunt of the injustice more than any other family. For Mohammed at least, he felt he had nothing to lose.”

The neighborhood where the family lived, Bab Alsibaa, held a rally for Zainab on Sunday, and people vowed the brutality that destroyed the Alhusni family could only strengthen their resolve.

“The case of Zainab Alhusni is not just for our town, or province, or even for the country of Syria. It is a human rights issue that should bring the attention of the world,” Fares said.

But despite Fares’ insistence that “after Zainab our chants are louder, our numbers greater,” he admitted the people of Bab Alsibaa constantly worry about their female family members.

“Even stepping outside the home is a risk for women now,” he said.

CNN

Lira

DOPE MUSIC VIDEO: LIRA-PHAKADE This is the best video to come out of Africa this year in our humble opinion. Enjoy!

(Source: 37thstate.com)

Just A Band

Video:

Just A Band - "Away"

featuring Michel Ongaro, Gebrüder Teichmann, Jahcoozi

"Away" was one of our contributions to the "BLNRB - Welcome to the Madhouse" album - a joint project between the Berlin and Nairobi music scenes - initiated by the Goethe-Institut Nairobi and the Teichmann Brothers.

Find out more here: http://www.outhere.de/?page_id=3555

Starring Stella Nasambu and Thimba Gichuki in a tale of obsession - :) - this video was produced and directed by Just A Band (as usual), with generous support from the Goethe-Institut Nairobi.

 

Vocal diva SARAH MITARU "kills it" on the song 'AWAY'. She was one of the featuring acts at a street concert held by JUST A BAND in Nairobi to open their video art exhibition 'KUDISHNYAO!'

 

Summer Sunday

Short Story Competition

Long, lazy afternoons on blazing beaches lapped by glittering seas, languid strolls through meadows ablaze with flowers or perhaps the hustle and bustle of the local mall, buzzing with a toddler’s demanding shriek and the muffled messages of an insistent tannoy.

Summer is all of these and much more so give your imagination free rein in our latest Quarterly Challenge!

All you have to do is write a short story which takes place on a Sunday in summer.

Word count should not exceed 1200 words.

Closing date: 30th September, 2011

FOUR ENTRIES £5

PLEASE NOTE!

If you are a Writer member of our writers' community Writelink you are eligible for FREE entry to this contest.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE

 

Refund Policy If you have difficulty in submitting your entry to our contest please contact support for assistance.

The Yellow Room

Autumn Short Story Competition

 

FOR SHORT STORIES OF UP TO 2,500 WORDS

 Closing date: 30th September 2011

 

1st Prize - £80

2nd Prize - £45

3rd Prize - £20

 

The winning story will be published in

The Yellow Room Magazine

 

Entry Fee: £4 (or £10 for 3 stories)

Pay for one entry online here:

 

 

Pay for 3 entries (£10) online here:

 

 

Cheques made payable to J M Derrick

 

All entries should be sent to:

The Yellow Room Competition, 1 Blake Close, Bilton, Rugby CV22 7LJ

CONDITIONS OF ENTRY

1. 1. Entries should be no more than 2,500 words, in any style or genre, on any theme.

2. 2. Entries should be the original, unpublished work of the author (including unpaid publication in competition anthologies, internet or small press), and should not have won a prize in any previous competitions.

3. 3. Entries should be in English, typed, double-spaced and on one side of the paper only, stapled at the top left hand corner. No binders or plastic wallets, please.

4. 4. Closing date is 30th September 2011

5. 5. The author’s name should not appear on the manuscript; please attach a separate sheet with contact details. The story’s title should appear on each page of the manuscript.

6. 6. Entrants may submit as many entries as they wish.

7. 7.No email entries, please!

8. 8.Manuscripts will NOT BE RETURNED. A list of results will appear on the website as soon as they are available (before December 2011).

9. 9.Please DO NOT send entries Recorded Delivery. This causes great inconvenience. Ensure sufficient postage is on your envelope, otherwise your entry won't reach us.

 

Entries which fail to conform to any of these requirements will be disqualified and entry fees will not be returned.

All prize winners will be notified before December 1st, 2011.

Copyright remains with the authors; but permission will be requested to include the winning entries in the The Yellow Room Magazine.

Nigerian Institute of

International Affairs Essay Competition

Deadline: 30 October 2011

Consistent with its mandate to “encourage and facilitate the understanding of international affairs and of the circumstances, conditions and attitudes of foreign countries and their peoples”, the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) is pleased to announce the inauguration of an Annual Essay Competition on Nigeria’s Foreign Policy. The objective of this initiative is to further arouse the interest of students of international relations in Nigerian Universities on the subject in view of the growing complexities and diversities in the relations among nations and their implications for Nigeria.

Institutional Eligibility:

The competition is open to both public and private universities recognized by National Universities Commission (NUC) in Nigeria.

Student Eligibility:

Participation is restricted only to final year students in the following departments as applicable to the various Nigerian universities:

1. Political Science
2. International Relations
3. Diplomatic History
4. Law and Diplomacy

Furthermore, only final year students with the highest cumulative point average in their respective departments are qualified to contest. The implication is that there will be only one contestant per department/University. Heads of the various departments are please requested to bring this to the attention of their students.

Title and Extent of the Essay:Political and Economic Development of Africa: A Case Study of Nigeria’s Roles

The essay should be sent to the NIIA Director-General in electronic form, typeset in Times New Roman, font size 12 and should not exceed six thousand words. Notes and references should be at the end. Microsoft word 2007 should be used.

Entry form can be down loaded from NIIA’s website www.niianet.org.

Deadline for Submission of Essays

All participating students should submit their essays via dgeneral@niianet.org before October 30, 2011. The best three essays will be announced at the Institute’s Patron’s Dinner that will hold in Abuja in December, 2011.

Prizes:

Prizes will include membership of the NIIA, internship at the NIIA, books, monetary awards and consolation prizes.

Contact Information:

For inquiries: contact the Assistant Director, Public Affairs, on telephone nos. 01-9500983, 08034737950

For submissions: dgeneral@niianet.org

Website: http://www.niianet.org