Typhoon Haiyan: Philippines relief efforts underway - live
LIVE• Confirmed death toll at 255 with 630,000 displaced
• Up to 10,000 believed dead in Tacloban city
• Heavy rains feared in south and central Philippines
• Haiyan weakened to 85mph before hitting Vietnam
• Up to 10,000 believed dead in Tacloban city
• Heavy rains feared in south and central Philippines
• Haiyan weakened to 85mph before hitting Vietnam
The Disaster Emergency Committee (DEC), a co-operative of more than a dozen leading UK charities, is expected to launch an appeal to help alleviate the humanitarian crisis in the Philippines.
The group of 14 NGOs, which includes the British Red Cross and Oxfam, has raised more than £1.1 billion in response to massive human tragedies.
The DEC elicited donations of more than £72 million following the 2010 floods in Pakistan, £107 million for the earthquake in Haiti and a record-breaking £392 million after a tsunami devastated much of south east Asia in 2004.
The international development secretary has been explaining how the UK is responding to the crisis.
Justine Greening said NHS experts had been flown with shelter kits and water purification facilities to Tacloban, where 10,000 people are believed to have died after Typhoon Haiyan struck on Friday.
The £6m British rapid response is being co-ordinated with aid agencies that already have a presence "on the ground", the minister told ITV's Daybreak.
But organisations are being hampered by widespread devastation. Emergency workers have been restricted by blocked roads and damaged airports as they raced to deliver tents, food and medicines to eastern Leyte Province.
Greening told the programme:
Prime Minister Cameron offered President Aquino our full support over the weekend. We have already released £6 million of support and that will go on to do two things.First of all, a rapid response facility. In other words, we have already got experts out there on the ground, more are flying in now and should be with them later today.That is focused on providing shelter kits - you saw some of the conditions people having to face at the moment.Also this issue of water, so water purification kits, and then expert advice. We've also flown out two NHS experts, and I think what we'll now do is quickly assess the scale of the needs.
Greek government survives confidence vote
Coalition’s majority tightens as deputy kicked out for supporting opposition motion
Greece’s conservative-led coalition defeated an opposition-sponsored motion to topple the government, but lost one politician who was expelled after backing the opposition.
A total 153 out of the parliament’s 300 members rejected the opposition’s censure motion. But prime minister Antonis Samaras’s coalition expelled one Socialist lawmaker who voted with the opposition, reducing the coalition’s majority to four.
The confidence vote was put forth last night by the main opposition Syriza party, which aims to overturn the austerity policies that the Greek government is implementing as a condition of its EU-IMF bailout.
PHILIPPINES
Logistics and past mistakes loom over relief
Aid organizations are struggling through blocked roads and devastated airports to bring relief to the Philippines. But past experience suggests that even tougher tasks lie ahead for the country.
Three days after Typhoon Haiyan - known locally as Yolanda - ravaged the region, the extent of thedevastation is only beginning to emerge. But even the official estimates of up to 10,000 deaths will likely increase, because more remote parts of the country are still inaccessible.
Several parts of the Philippines - Leyte Island, Samar island, and the northern end of Cebu, to the west - which were in the path of the storm, are yet to be accessed fully. Relief organizations have reported widespread chaos, and communications down across the country - with international help already on its way.
One reader from the town of President Roxas on Panay Kabisaayan, contacted DW via Facebook to say, "Until now we don't have electricity, all the networks is down, no communications from my family."
Afghans who helped US in war denied visas
November 11, 2013
Kevin Sieff
Kabul, Afghanistan: A growing number of Afghan interpreters who worked alongside American troops are being denied US visas allotted by Congress because the State Department says there is no serious threat against their lives.
But the interpreters, many of whom served in Taliban havens for years, say US officials are drastically underestimating the danger they face. Immigration attorneys and Afghan interpreters say the denials are occurring just as concerns about Taliban retribution are mounting due to the withdrawal of US forces.
"There are tons of Talibs in my village, and they all know that I worked with the Americans," said one interpreter, Mohammad, who asked that his last name not be published for security reasons. "If I can't go to the States, my life is over. I swear to God, one day the Taliban will catch me."
Rwanda's M23 gamble backfires
UN experts have accused Uganda and Rwanda of backing M23 rebels, and despite denials, officials in Kigali have been anxious over the turn of events.
Rwanda, under intense international pressure over its alleged covert aid to M23 rebels in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, has maintained total silence since the group's defeat.
The March 23 Movement (M23) announced this week it was ending its 18-month insurgency after suffering a resounding rout at the hands of the Congolese army with key backing from a special UN intervention brigade.
The rebels are now under pressure to sign a formal peace deal on Monday in Uganda, to where most of its fighters have fled. Scores of wounded fighters have also fled to Rwanda.
UN experts have accused Uganda and in particular Rwanda of backing the rebels, and despite angry denials, officials in Kigali have been clearly anxious over the turn of events.
11 November 2013 Last updated at 01:37 GMT
Aiming to change the outcome of World War One
Even at moments of remembrance the origins of World War One seem as distant as the fall of Rome. The steps in the doomed diplomatic dance in the summer of 1914 are hopelessly remote to the modern mind.
It's not just the imperial ambitions and the strategic balances - this was a world where politicians still wore frock coats and the seditious syncopations of ragtime were an affront to Christian decency.
But there are places where the furtive manoeuvrings of the politicians - which went on in parallel with the fighting - still feel like unfinished business.
Very few Western Europeans could tell you what the main result of World War One really was - except that it led directly to World War Two.
It brought countless indirect changes too of course, but they are hard to measure.
No comments:
Post a Comment