Help End Poverty

The Facts—

The world’s mountains cover about one-fourth of the planet’s land surface and are home to 10 percent of its population. They are a sanctuary for an extraordinary web of plant and animal life and a source of water for all of the world’s major rivers.

Yet mountain people, the guardians of these valuable mountain resources, are among the world’s poorest, hungriest and most marginalized populations. Indeed, many of the more-than-800 million chronically undernourished people in the world today live in mountain areas.

“Eradication of Extreme Poverty” is, in fact, the number-one priority of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals for the world community. Unfortunately, as of 2004 in Nepal for instance, the U.N. has categorized this Goal as “far behind.”

In cooperation with our Partner Organizations, The Mountain Fund is dedicated to achieving the Millennium Development Goals at the grassroots level.

About The Mountain Fund—

The Mountain Fund is a global coalition of grassroots non-profit and non-governmental organizations devoted to eliminating the causes and symptoms of poverty in developing mountain cultures around the world. The Mountain Fund works to increase the capacity of these small organizations by providing marketing, publicity, organizational consulting and valuable networking tools. The Mountain Fund also provides financial, administrative and technical assistance to its Partner Organizations.

Ecovillage Subdivision Concept

We are a group of men, women, children, and elders who have come together spontaneously and miraculously with the same vision to create a family-centered intentional eco-village subdivision where each family will own their own 1 hectare (approx. 2.5 acres) parcel. We envision this community on 700-1200 acres in the Pacific Northwest with 200 or more parcels that have a generous, forested alleyway surrounding each parcel so that parcels do not touch. We envision 100 acres of private community space with stables for horses and space for goats and chickens, art studios, a technology center, workshops, a school our children will design and build, healing spaces, and community forest. We also envision another 100 acres for public space that would include healing spaces, a farmer’s market, perhaps a small resort and/or campground, and a park.

We are currently developing a means of recognizing and establishing heart-resonance for accepting new neighbors. We expect to have some writings that will describe this process in the upcoming weeks. In the meantime, if you choose to receive more information, contact me!

love,Scott

Today, over 27,000 children died around the world

Today, over 27,000 children died around the world

• by Anup Shah

Around the world, 27–30,000 children die every day.

That is equivalent to:

• 1 child dying every 3 seconds
• 20 children dying every minute
• A 2004 Asian Tsunami occurring almost every week
• An Iraq-scale death toll every 15–35 days
• 10–11 million children dying every year
• Over 50 million children dying between 2000 and 2005

The silent killers are poverty, hunger, easily preventable diseases and illnesses, and other related causes. In spite of the scale of this daily/ongoing catastrophe, it rarely manages to achieve, much less sustain, prime-time, headline coverage.

Seed funding for social entrepreneurs

Visionaries Wanted!

• Do you have an incredible, new idea that could change your community, country, or world? • Are you an entrepreneur who won’t rest until your idea has been brought to life? Or a leader who has recently started an organization to do just that?

If so, apply for an Echoing Green Fellowship. You could receive up to $90,000 in seed funding and support to launch a new organization that turns your innovative idea for social change into action.

Follow in the footsteps of the founders of Teach For America, City Year, and over 400 other social change organizations and apply online by December 3, 2007.

Watch the video: http://www.echoinggreen.org/video Find out whether you qualify: http://www.echoinggreen.org/shouldyouapply Apply online: https://apply.echoinggreen.org Questions? Contact us at apply@echoinggreen.org.

Slideshow: A Global Community for Change

You can now watch a short slideshow to learn more about The Mountain Fund: Who We Are & What We Do…

• Just click HERE!

Launch Graphic: Fair Trade

This is a launch test and is my first piece of graphic journalism on and for rethos. Feedback greatly appreciated! Li Li

“What Will Save Us” c. Li Li 2007

Medical Camp Moves Mountains in Nepal

Kathmandu, Nepal Oct 28, 2007

The October 11-24, 2007 “Moving Medical Camp”, organized by The Mountain Fund, in cooperation with “Karing for Kids – Nepal”, served over 1000 patients in seven villages.

The 25 member medical team which is composed of US, UK and Nepali Doctors and Nurses, as well as Nepali translators, visited 7 villages in the remote Rasuwa District on the Tibetan border, and just finished giving free medical care to over 1000 indigenous Tamang inhabitants of the area.

The medical team included OBGYN, Pediatric, Optometric and General Medicine practioneers. Over 225 eye patients received glasses and vision assistance. (A more detailed report will follow this press release.)

The Medical Team included, Michael Falcone, Dr. Beth-Hall Thompson, Tu Mach, Dr. Dorothy Kammerer-Doak, Susie Rivard-Dibenedetto, Shelly Ogle, David Diaz, Robert Doak, Lindsey Mahlstedt, Ann McCollum, Kerry Flint, Christina Quack, Peter Korpi, Katie Korpi, Puskar Gurung, Sudhir Lama, Dr. Alish Prajapati, Teja Raut, Sudha Dhungana, Kopila Lama, Phurbu Tamang, Dipendra Shrestha, Dipendra Lama, Nima Tamang and Jimyang Lama. Special thanks to Dr. Alish Prajapati who was our official medical host from Nepal.

Much thanks to Mountain Hardwear for the Space Stations that were used as portable clinic buildings and Phillips Environmental for the PETT toilet systems.

About The Mountain Fund: Our mission is to organize grassroots non-profit and non- governmental organizations from a diversity of disciplines, and to support and coordinate these organizations’ efforts to eliminate poverty, its causes and symptoms, in developing mountain communities around the world.

Website: http://www.mountainfund.org

About Karing For Kids – Nepal: Karing for Kids – Nepal is a partner within The Mountain Fund, and has operated a Mother-Child Health Clinic in Goljung, Rasuwa, Nepal since the late 1990’s.

Website: http://www.karingforkids.org

The Mountain Fund Scott MacLennan email: mtnfund@mountainfund.org

If They Were One of Us... No true representative government here!

The kicker to this piece being:

If you are without a permanent address, you do not GET to vote.

Even if you work, pay taxes, send your kids to school, pray, meditate, support the local economy, keep your neighborhood clean (even if that means picking up bottles for the deposit!!), are kind to others, polite, clean, and well-mannered… no home, no vote!

So in light of THAT, what DO the elections and the candidates truly signify?

Are the candidates YOUR servants? Or do THEY serve others with more money and political pull than (even) the President?

Feedback, please!!

Li Li

Abana : Rwandan children living with HIV tell their stories

“Abana” means “children” in the Kininyarwanda language of Rwanda. MSF treats young people living with HIV, who are now coming of age and sexually identifying in a country where stigma is high, and their very existence is a reminder of the country’s troubled past. See their art-therapy drawings, hear their voices, and watch their video interviews at http://www.msf.ca/abana/

Celebrating our 3rd Social Capitalist Award

THE JUNCTION: DECEMBER 2007 CALVERT FOUNDATION’S eNEWSLETTER Connecting Investors to Communities

• NEWSWORTHY

• SPOTLIGHT ON

• ASK SHARI *

WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE PARENTS WHO WANT TO GET THEIR TEENAGERS INVOLVED IN PHILANTHROPY?

As a Mom with a teen herself, getting my daughter Moriah involved with philanthropy has been a way for us to connect as a family around a theme we all care about. Like many others, our schools require teens to participate in community service. This has let my daughter see firsthand that not everyone is as fortunate as she is, but that we are all working hard to create the best world for ourselves and our children.

We have been encouraging Moriah to set aside a portion of her allowance so that she can donate to local projects. Once she understood the impact she was creating, the motivation to do more came from this initial experience. I’d like to think that we have started what will be a life long pursuit – sharing what we have with those in need.

Happy Holidays! And as always, thank you for all you do to support communities.

Ask Shari a question: newsletter@calvertfoundation.org

Clothing for kids with Autism/SPD

Soft (clothing for all children) is a specialized line of clothing for children with extreme sensory sensitivity, or “tactile defensiveness”, which is associated with Autism, Aspergers, and Sensory Processing Disorder. The clothing is being developed by a special educator, as well as a team of designers, therapists, and parents of kids with sensory sensitivity.

Right now, we are finalists to recieve a grant to make our clothing, and all we need is the greatest number of votes to win. Please take one moment to vote for our idea on IDEABLOB.COM by December 31st. Voting only takes a moment, and this idea will really help a lot of people! If you have not already registered, you must do so to vote, however only your name, email, and a password are necessary to register (you can leave the other fields blank). A few clicks may take this idea a very long way!

Click here to vote:

http://ideablob.com/ideas/843-A-line-of-inclusive-children-

For more information on the adaptive clothing line, please see: www.softclothing.net

or our blog: www.softclothingforallchildren.blogspot.com

Happy Holidays and Happy VOTING!

Best,

Jessica Elsas Soft(clothing for all children) www.softclothing.net info@softclothing.net

"For Yubaraj"

In May 2006, Yahoo! Hot Zone journalist Kevin Sites wrote about Yubaraj Khadka, a Nepalese boy who had been supporting his family by parking motorcycles on the streets of Kathmandu. Many people who read about Yubaraj wanted to find a way to enroll him in school, to reward him for working so hard and to give him the means to build a better life.

My Culture Killed Lawrence King

Yesterday evening, I attended a candle light vigil for Lawrence King in West  Hollywood.

My culture tells me that children must adhere to certain rigid rules of conduct, decorum, dress and manners depending solely on the genitalia they receive at birth. If born with a penis children are required to behave as “boys”.  The strict boundaries required of “boys” are part of the social conditioning imposed to create conformity in sex roles.  Adolescence is a time when children begin the transformation to sexual maturity.  For any child it is difficult and confusing. For a significant percentage of children whose sexual/gender orientation does not fit within the normative standards, adolescence is a nightmare. For them my culture has a number of coercive mechanisms to force compliance.  Usually peer pressure, a lack of role models, and direct shaming is sufficient to send these sexual/gender outlaws running for the obscurity of the anonymous “closet”.  

Occasionally a child is brave enough to defy these mechanisms; brave enough to dare to be who he or she is and to feel no need to apologize or to act in conformity with the arbitrary rules of my culture. Fourteen year old Lawrence King was one of these children. For brave kids like Lawrence my culture has an age old mechanism:

My culture kills them.

This week in the computer lab of an Oxnard California middle school, 14 year old Brandon McInearny pulled a gun from his school nap sack, held it to the head of Lawrence King, and pulled the trigger.  Laurence was one of our children. So was Brandon.  

My culture taught Brandon to hate Lawrence. My culture taught Brandon to kill. My culture enlisted Brandon to execute Lawrence and thus ended both of these young lives in an instant.

But why?

Lawrence broke the rules. Lawrence dared to allow his true self, a self incompatible with the standards required of “boys”, to emerge and to be given expression in a world obsessed with obeisance to an artifact system of sex roles so obsolete as to have had no functional justification since homo-sapiens first climbed down out of the trees.  

My culture displays corporately sponsored and approved forms of androgyny and gender non-conformity. But the media should come with the disclaimer: “Don’t try this at home.”

My culture supports a science that pathologizes individuality in adolescents. Children who fail to conform to normative standards when so clearly motivated by shaming and peer pressure are said to suffer from Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD), a disorder recognized by the psychiatric profession and codified in the DSM IV.

My culture teaches me to hate and fear that which is different.

My culture tells little boys that it is good to emulate acts of violence in play; to have toy soldiers and plastic guns, but not to play with Barbies or E-Z bake ovens.

My culture really doesn’t care if I am gay or straight, black, white, brown, yellow red or lavender. My culture hates us all. Hate, ignorance, fear and bigotry, all enshrined by my culture, loaded the gun put in Brandon’s hand and taught him to shoot it.

My culture teaches children to kill children.

Goodnight, Lawrence…I am sorry that my culture decided not to let you grow up.

(photo and text by Alec Henderson)

Get Real - Towards A Compassionate Medical Marijuana Policy

Isn’t it finally time for a compassionate medical marijuana policy? For too long the issue has been held up by cultural prejudices and long held political grudges. It’s the old hippie/square square-off and its time now to get over it and act like adults when it comes to health care. In a country where there are still open wounds over the Civil War, and in a world where millennium-old grudges are still at play in the Middle East and elsewhere, it’s no surprise that irritations over Jane Fonda and burned draft cards still ring loud and clear in our politics today. What a travesty however that they can insert themselves into what should otherwise be a sane medical policy. When it comes to health care we need to have a cold-eyed pragmatism, a respect for science, and most of all respect for the experiences of the patient.

Sadly this is often not the case. A lot of people with power and voice can’t seem to separate the cultural history of the drug from its benefits that we can see today. A lot more people don’t seem to have the courage to bring this unpopular but extremely simple issue into in a national dialogue. There is a lot of talk of morality in this country, but what morality is there in making political hay from an issue that denies relief from people who are suffering? Opponents claim that there is not enough medical evidence for the safety of the medical use of marijuana. Remember that the next time you hear about a Viagra heart attack, or a Paxil induced teenage suicide.

The truth is, the evidence does bear out marijuana’s efficacy for a number of ailments.

I lost two of my brothers to AIDS. The both suffered a relentless sequence of opportunistic infections and an exhausting regimen of treatment. AZT, one of the first retroviral drugs approved by the FDA for treatment of AIDS had previously been developed as chemotherapy and then shelved as being too toxic and intolerable. Along with this drug they endured chemotherapy, radiation, biopsies, blood tests, spinal taps and countless pills on top of pills on top of pills. Combine this with a host of other new and experimental pharmaceuticals, military strength antibiotics, anti-fungals, anti-nauseals, anti-depressants and you have one big sick cocktail with a lot of side effects. There was of course no other option. AIDS patients found themselves not only sick but trapped in a system with no choices. It was the vocal, activist wing of the AIDS advocacy movement that actually moved our national discussion of healthcare to acknowledge greater patient autonomy and industry accountability. That impulse, especially in the drone of vague health care proposals in this year’s election cycle, is exactly what we need to realign medicine with its original purpose, health and compassion, and not to serve as tool of politics and profit.

It was no secret back then, nor had it been for years before that that marijuana use reduced nausea and stimulated appetite in cancer patients. It is also proven to help sufferers of glaucoma. My late brother Michael smoked pot during his illness. He had suffered for four years though Pneumocystis pneumonia, Cryptococcus Meningitis, Thrush, Lyme Disease, Kaposi’s Sarcoma and numerous other opportunistic infections. Using marijuana was the only thing that brought him temporary relief from nausea, the discomfort from the combined medications, the aches and pains from his ailments. It also held at bay the aggressive wasting that withered otherwise “healthy” AIDS patients down to unsustainable weights. I witnessed it first hand, across the kitchen table in my parents’ house. The joint was smoked, the water put on the boil, soon there was a big pot of macaroni and a bowl of ice cream to wash it down. Also, since marijuana is a mild sedative and can be a mood elevator in many of the people who use it. I watched my brother transform from a depressed, sick person, to a relaxed, funny, smiling fighter who could finally eat.

Michael had previously been prescribed Marinol, the synthetic pharmaceutical THC replacement approved by the government, but its soporific effects were too strong and it did not stimulate his appetite in the same way as the herb in its natural form. In this case the plant was illegal but the product was not. When I was in college I was hospitalized with a pretty fierce tonsular abscess. (I say that when I am embarrassed to say “tonsillitis”.) Sure it hurt, and I was dizzy with fever for a while but there was never any real threat to my life. I couldn’t eat with a swollen throat and was given IV antibiotics. I was also given Demerol, every four hours, at my request. The antibiotics took care of the abscess, the swelling and therefore most of the pain. Still I had on demand access to one of the most powerful narcotics available for pain - a drug unlike marijuana which is dangerous and has tremendous potential for abuse and physical dependency.

Lots of prescription drugs are similarly dangerous and together account for almost one hundred thousand deaths a year in the hospital. There are to date zero deaths caused by marijuana on record, and don’t wait around for that statistic to move very much any time soon. Oxycontin, the bull in the china shop of prescription painkillers, quickly took the lead in a deadly epidemic of addiction and abuse in this country. It is still produced, still legal for prescription, and still dangerous. And what of my Demerol “lost weekend”? I wonder ultimately how much that cost.

Towards the end of Michael’s life my mother realized the positive effects that marijuana had on his quality of life. She could see it just as I had, everyday in the house where she lived, her son, across the kitchen table. And you know what they say, a mother just knows. It wasn’t long before she was driving him to meet a friend of mine who could get marijuana for Michael. For the record lets just say that between hippie and square my mom is definitely more of the latter, more at home in the minivan, at Key Food, at a Wednesday Matinee with her theatre group, or in church where she attends Mass every morning. Drug runs just aren’t her style. In this case however she was that well-needed cold-eyed pragmatist, and that brave, big-hearted activist, taking things into her own hands and moving the country, one son at a time towards a more compassionate marijuana policy.

Just a note: My brother Vincent did not use marijuana during his illness. He exercised that choice in his treatment, as my brother Michael exercised his, albeit illegitimately. Should my mom go to jail for supporting him?

Kids are growing up too fast...

Lately i've been realizing more and more everyday that kids these days are just growing up a little too "pre-maturely" if you were to ask me. Why is this? Well, kids want to be adults! And yes, every kid goes through this. No child ever wants to stay their age because they want to do all the "cool" stuff the adults are doing.

But lately i've been seeing something completely different. Two months ago almost I saw a 10 year old smoking a cigarette. I also saw last night a bunch of 12-13 year old girls walking around in short skirts and everything in downtown Toronto! More and more youth gangs are starting to develop. Normally a gang has a leader, usually 25-30 years old or higher than that.

But now, we have 14 year olds running their own gangs. Legit gangs too. I'm talking guns, knives, drugs and all that jazz. When I was 14 all I cared about was watching wrestling and listening to Chumbawumba. But now it seems like kids are skipping that aspect in their life. Just jumping in to the real world with no thought of what could happen to them.

One must ask, why does this happen? Well there are a lot of reasons. Statistics show that kids with bad parents do this kind of stuff. Also kids that grow up with no parents relent to this kind of activity too. But in the end, I don't really care what their past is like. My childhood sucked and look at me, I'm fine. That's because when you turn 12-13, you start making choices.

You start realizing the difference between right and wrong, as a young adult. But for some reason, these kids aren't getting that. They are watching the movies, listening to the music and actually believing that it's all real. Which causes them to go out in the real world and act out everything they are taught. Especially if they have an intravert leading them, like a gang member/leader.

My question is this. How can we stop this? Obviously the youth programs aren't working. Big Brother is just temporary and lead the kids on. We are going in to another recession soon, no money to help the kids. Today almost 40% of all parents either beat, harass or put down their kids or don't even see them.

So how do we stop this rising epidemic?

"Do You Want This Program? " - 'When Enough is Plenty"

"Not your average lunch lady" - Matthew Aquilone

I’m a public school kid, a “Cement Baby,” Brooklyn born and raised.  I was a late comer to school lunch though, always being sent off with a brown bag or more likely running home for lunch since I lived close to my school, could see it in fact from my bedroom window. It was that kind of neighborhood, a thorough network of moms, friends, front stoops and kitchen tables.  As my brothers and I became more independent my mother started working full time and there were no more lunches at home.  My parents then enrolled us in the hot lunch program.

I remember it as a pretty emotional event.  Gone were the comfort and security of mom and home and homemade meals.  Replacing it was hair netted lunch ladies ladling barely recognizable substances onto plastic trays accompanied by miniscule cartons of milk.  The lunchroom was a loud chaotic place, one I had not really experienced.  Strange smells a nd faces, a phalanx of teachers, parent chaperones and our drill sergeant vice principal keeping the hundreds of kids at their tables in relative order.  Of course for some if not most of my classmates the lunchroom was a very familiar place.  It was where they ate most of their meals.  A large segment of the student body were part of the free breakfast program as well as lunch.  In general this enrollment divided itself among racial and economic lines.  I didn’t give much thought to it back then but most of my classmates relied on the school not just for their education, but for the bulk of their nutrition and their very survival as well.

Of course by now we have come a long way from Salisbury steaks and what could nominally be identified as peas and carrots that were served up in my youth.  Food consciousness has risen to one of the most important issues both globally and locally.  It is a matter that has economic, environmental, and technological as well as spiritual implications.  A good friend of mine, Nancy Easton, an educator and mother here in NYC, has created a program called Wellness in the Schools that directly addresses the connection between nutrition and education.  Pamela Enz sat down with her to find out more about it.

                                 “ Do You Want This Program?”

                                        ‘ When Enough is Plenty” - Pamela Enz

               Much like two of Rethos’ founders, cousins Alex and Pablo Salzman, Nancy Easton is an example of a youthful passion successfully transformed into adult action.  A fellow Princeton alumnus she is co-creator of WITS: Wellness in the Schools, in short, a program based on the belief that a mind eager and ready to learn begins with a healthy body.

              The foundation of the Salzmans’s success was I believe having a socially conscious, progressive and still active grandma paired with an inborn entrepreneurial bent.  Ms Easton’s familial foundation was her own original “Earth Mother “ mom.  Until her teens whole-wheat cookies and the granola contribution to the school bake sale along with the UGH! compost heap was a great embarrassment.  It wasn’t until entering college that Nancy began to see the world catching up and that her mother’s “eccentricities” contained an embarrassment of riches, spiritual, spirited joys and life lessons.  From a comfortable background she and her siblings were raised knowing that needs would be met, were in fact lucky to be able to taken for granted, but “wants” and certainly excess were not part of the equation.

               For Nancy privilege was used to follow her heart and teach. What drove her to public education was I believe, like the Salzmans’s inborn – her love of sports, running in particular, which led to joining the track team.  Dubbed “White Lightning” by her mostly black teammates she observed in dropping them off at public housing projects, the inequities of their lives. 

               Combined with her great capacity for nurturing and special insight and love of children it was not a great leap for her to want to do something and figure out how she personally could affect positive change.   

    What basic needs must be met for learning to occur? What was needed to equalize educational opportunities for children across the board?,

     Working together with Kirsten Brashares and Rachel Tore “Wellness in the Schools” was created to explore these questions.  They concluded that what is essential to learning and every child’s right, is a clean environment, free of damaging chemicals that contribute both to asthmas and sick days, as well as adequate healthy food and exercise without which learning becomes much more challenged.

            Some of the programs begun or in the planning stages are cooking and nutrition classes, plus visits to markets and farms.cerun: yes">  They hope next year to have both a Chef-In Residence and Athlete-In Residence at as many schools as possible.  To learn more about all the programs that she and her other cofounders Kirsten Brashares and Rachel Tore have formed and ways you can participate I strongly urge you to visit their website Wellnessintheschools.org 

              In the meantime parents and concerned adults should be aware that there have been two pieces of legislation passed, one mandating a Wellness Committee in all schools, and a second guaranteeing a clean environment for all students.

               Ms. Easton describes best WITS involvment:

             “Inspired by Governor Pataki’s mandate that all schools in the state of New York convert to green cleaning by September of 2006, we worked to ensure that the mandate was met.  We insisted that the products used in our schools are the least toxic, most efficacious and cost-effective.

               In addition to implementing specific pilot programs, we have introduced Wellness Committees into schools, a mandate introduced in 2007 by Governor Pataki.  These Wellness Committees form the basis of our work, as we assess needs, share information and empower parents to continue to make their schools healthier.”

    Ms. Easton also asserts that busy adults caring for growing children can work at home on fostering healthy habits . Most important is to include as much as possible children themselves in shopping and preparing food. She suggests beginning with talking to younger children about balancing their plates using color.  How many are there on their plates? Or create rainbows from a weekly menu, and please if anyone knows let us in on how to avoid the junk food aisles in the supermarket.

    Others, more inclined toward cocktails and networking I suggest buying tickets to the upcoming benefit for WITS on May 15^th and supporting this wonderful effort.

Relatives Seek Justice as Peru’s Largest Mass Grave is Exhumed

AdvocacyNet
News Bulletin 141
*****

June 4, 2008, Putis, Peru: The exhumation of Peru's largest mass grave has opened a window on Peru's shadowy war against terrorism in the Andes, and encouraged indigenous families who lost relatives to demand justice and reparations.
 
The exhumation was completed last Thursday at the remote village of Putis, high in the Peruvian Andes. Braving freezing conditions and drug traffickers, a team from the Peruvian Forensic Anthropology Team (EPAF) spent two weeks extracting almost 60 skeletons and the remains of about 10 more bodies from a shallow grave.
 
Ash Kosiewicz, a Peace Fellow from the Advocacy Project (AP) volunteering with EPAF this summer, and Iain Guest, Executive Director of AP, spent several days at the site.
 
The Putis exhumation is the largest of its kind in Peru's history. Jose Pablo Baraybar, the director of EPAF, predicted that it would accelerate efforts to investigate the fate of more than 15,000 Peruvians who disappeared between 1982 and 2000. Most of the victims are thought to have been buried in clandestine graves, but only 505 had been retrieved before last week.
 
Putis is located in the province of Ayacucho in southern Peru, which bore the brunt of a brutal conflict between the Peruvian Army and Shining Path guerrillas. The victims were Quechua-speaking Indians who were isolated and marginalized, making it hard for their families to lobby for justice.
 
Identifying the dead, Mr Baraybar said, would help them to claim the rights held by other Peruvians. "They have to be assisted to recover their citizenship and use the same tools that the state gives all of us to advocate."
 
Last week's exhumation may have begun the process. Gerardo Fernandez Mendoza, who heads an association of 250 Putis relatives, told a press conference that 430 victims were buried in 14 clandestine graves in the area and that once the bodies are recovered reparations must be paid. "We need health centers and schools. Our livelihood was taken away from us," he said.
 
The Putis massacre occurred after hundreds of villagers were displaced from their homes in late 1984 and rounded up by soldiers. A group of 123 villagers were taken to Putis and shot on December 13, 1984. The largest grave, which was uncovered last week, is thought to contain 76 bodies.
 
The exhumation recovered over 70 bullet casings, including some in the grave which may have come from an officer's gun. This suggests that victims were shot at close range. Many were children, including babies.
 
About 40 relatives walked for hours through the mountains last Thursday to visit the gravesite and provide DNA samples that will be matched with the bones recovered by EPAF. Many relatives wept at their first sight of the grave and pointed to fragments of clothing that seemed familiar. They said a communal prayer before leaving.
 
Guillermina Quispe Coronado, who lost 13 family members in the Putis massacre, said she was distressed to see the remains but hopeful that her relatives can now be buried in peace. "We thought that no one was interested," she said.
 
The relatives are determined to seek justice, and there was at least one eyewitness to the massacre. But any criminal investigation by the prosecutor's office will probably meet resistance from the Peruvian Army, which has refused to provide the names of those operating around Putis in late 1984.
 
Meanwhile, EPAF expects to resume exhumations within the month at four other gravesites in Putis. The work will likely become harder as winter approaches, and security is also a concern. Last week, a firefight was narrowly avoided when a group of armed drug traffickers passed by the EPAF compound at night and almost ran into an army patrol.
 
EPAF's team has drawn praise for working in such difficult conditions. Cristina Olazabal, a deputy prosecutor in Ayacucho, described the exhumation as "professional and disciplined."
 
Greg Maggio, a senior official from the US State Department who also attended the exhumation, praised the sensitivity with which EPAF dealt with family members. Mr Maggio works in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, which funded the Putis exhumation.

Nepalese children at school

Nepalese children at a private school

Women and children at a Nepalese temple

Wastepicker children in India

*****
AdvocacyNet
News Bulletin 144
June 20, 2008
*****
 
Wastepicker Children Face Discrimination from Private School in India
 
June 20, 2008, Delhi, India: In a graphic example of the deep discrimination that faces India's urban poor, a well-known private school in Delhi has refused to admit seven wastepicker children out of fear that they might carry diseases.
 
The children, aged 6 to 8, spent months getting ready to enter the Salwan School at Pusa Road with the encouragement of a teacher there. Then, an hour after they had met the principal, they received an unwelcome phone call. The arrangement was off.
 
"It is scary to find that an educational institute would do this," said Bharati Chaturvedi, Director of Chintan Environmental Research and Action Group. "It tells us how intuitive and deep the discrimination against wastepickers runs, and the enormous barriers they face just to be treated as human beings."
 
Chintan, a Delhi-based partner of The Advocacy Project, had helped the seven children (six girls and one boy) to gain entrance to the school. Following the rebuff, the group is advising them to continue their studies in government schools, where they have faced taunting from teachers and other children because of their status as wastepickers.
 
Wastepickers scour through open trash bins for recyclable paper, metals, glass and plastics, which they then sell. According to Chintan, they account for almost 1 percent of Delhi's population and handle about 20 percent of the city's waste. They earn, on average, one or two dollars a day.
 
Although the Indian government has banned child labor, the poorest children often pick waste because they have no other means to support themselves and their families. Paul Colombini, an AP Peace Fellow volunteering with Chintan this summer, saw this first-hand recently when he visited the Seemapuri wastepicker community.
 
"Whole families typically work together in the waste-picking business, and most wastepicking children are not able to attend school," Mr Colombini wrote in his blog. Even when they can attend school, he wrote, the children face discrimination: "Teachers were known to not allow them in classes on the assumption that they were illegal immigrants."
 
As wastepicking children move through the city collecting garbage, they are bullied into cleaning private homes, beaten by municipal sweepers and police, and sometimes even sexually assaulted, according to Chintan.
 
The work also exposes the children to germs, toxins, and injuries. A Chintan study found that 84 percent of wastepicker children are anemic, and that more than 22 percent suffer from four or more health problems.
 
Chintan tries to turn these child laborers into full-time students through a program known as "No Child in Bins." Chintan runs four learning centers in Delhi, and reaches out to about 300 wastepicker children.
 
The seven children who sought admittance to the Salwan School had all been recruited into Chintan's learning centers from the slums of Takiya Kale Khan and Nizamuddin. They then went on to government schools, where they excelled despite the taunting, according to Ms Chaturvedi.
 
Their families put up with considerable hardship to help them move to the next level and gain entrance to Salwan, a top private school. The children were preparing to take an entrance exam when school officials abruptly changed their minds.
 
Ms Chaturvedi criticized the school's actions as akin to caste discrimination. "In all this, one thing is clear," she said. "If we want to get children out of work and into school, we must change attitudes, and invest in changing these."