International Week 2010!

As some of you may know, from February 1-5 the University of Alberta is hosting International Week 2010. This is a great opportunity to hear speakers and meet activists and experts who are passionately engaged on any number of different fronts. I have listed some lectures below and strongly encourage you to take advantage of any that you can (the majority are free!). When I was in high school I had the opportunity to see Stephen Lewis at I-Week and it was life changing. It's not often we get this many experts in one place in Edmonton so COME OUT!

Monday Feb. 1, 12:00 - 1:30 PM - Myer Horowitz: Donna Brazile speaking on "Civic Engagement, Creating Lasting Change"
This woman is crazy! She's worked on every presidential campaign from 1976 through 2000, where she served as campaign manager for Al Gore and continues to play an active role in the Democratic National Committee. For political junkies, this lecture is a must!

Monday Feb. 1, 5:00 - 6:30 PM - TELUS Centre 150: Film "Good Morning Kandahar" followed by a discussion with Brigadier-General John Vance and others.

Monday Feb. 1, 7:30-9:00 PM - TELUS Centre 150: Canada's Future Role in the World - a roundtable with people from DFAIT, CIDA, Canada's World and Dr. Tom Keating from the Dept. of Political Science
If you're interested in Canadian diplomacy and development efforts this should be an interesting discussion.

Tuesday Feb. 2, 7:30-9:00 PM - TELUS Centre 150: Towards a Canadian Arctic Strategy
Need I say more Security Council delegates?! GO! GO!


Wednesday Feb. 3, 7:30-9:00 PM - TELUS Centre 150: World Poverty: Explanations, Responsibilities, Reforms
I'm not as confident that this will be a good session but the topic is interesting and I-Week doesn't usually mess around with bringing in less-than-quality keynote presenters. The presenter, Dr. Thomas Pogge, is from Yale University and heads efforts towards creating a new pharmaceutical patent regime that would improve access to medicines for poor people worldwide.

Thursday Feb. 4, 5:00-6:30 PM - TELUS Centre 150: Film "Toxic Trespass"
This film looks at the chemical soup constantly surrounding us and how governments respond to the dire health threats. Could be useful for UNEP delegates!

Thursday Feb. 4, 7:30-9:00 PM - TELUS Centre 150: When Worlds Collide: Ethics and the Global Pandemic Response
HELLO, WORLD HEALTH ORG. DELEGATES, this roundtable will look at the ethics of fighting a global pandemic. Who should get access to medication first? How do we role out immunization campaigns? While there will likely be a heavy focus on Canada, I would still urge anyone who can to go since this panel is directly addressing the ethical issues surrounding access to medication during pandemics!

Alright, so now you have some week night options for next week! You can find a listing of all the events in the I-Week program!

Tensions rising in Venezuela and Asia

As the news cycle continues to be dominated by Haiti, particularly as more accurate death tolls become available and a conference begins tomorrow which aims to lay out a long-term development plan for the country, I thought I would briefly discuss a few other stories happening globally.

First, in anticipation of an election in September, Venezuela's opposition parties are stirring up dissent. There are reports that tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets Saturday to protest the Chavez regime. Mostly, they are unhappy with the rolling blackouts, water rationing and widespread crime. However, later that day, they had new reason to be upset when it was announced that Chavez was taking a tv station that refused to broadcast a presidential address off the air. Earlier last week, he nationalized several stations in order to better control what they broadcast. This is a clear attack on freedom of speech in the country and the international community should be concerned. Just over a week ago, Venezuelans also saw their currency devalued, a move which is regarded with much skepticism by The Economist.

Second, tensions within Asia and between Asian countries and the international community have been ratcheted up lately. There's the US-China diplomatic row over attacks on Google, a crackdown on democracy activists in Vietnam, declarations of pre-emptive strikes between North and South Korea, protests in Hong Kong and the jailing of a HK dissident by China. Responding to these new developments, The Economist has published a number of articles this week regarding Chinese relations with its neighbours and the EU, as well as on their hot economy which has many fearing the development of dangerous bubbles. Delegates are advised to keep their eyes on the region as relations with the Asian giant have come to play a huge roll in the success of UN sessions. Moreover, as China's neighbours become more embroiled in dispute, security becomes a greater concern and as we all know, an insecure or pre-occupied country is one which often makes ill-advised foreign policy decisions.

Third, Afghanistan continues to be a mess. Its elections have now been postponed because of a lack of funding from donor countries who are fed up with the corruption in the state. On a more hopeful note, CBC radio had an interview this morning with Greg Mortenson who has been working to build schools in Afghanistan for years and provided at least a little hope for the recovery of the country.

Fourth, since Christmas, Yemen has been hitting the news more often. Keep an eye on articles detailing the ongoing action against Al-Qaeda, and relations between Yemen and its neighbour, Saudi Arabia.

Finally, I should note that although I chose not to link to articles on Haiti, it will be interesting to watch reports of the conference tomorrow and in the upcoming days. The world has rarely seen the need to engage in humanitarian relief on this scale and without at least cursory demands to respect sovereignty. At this point, it is hard to imagine Haiti will have a functioning state or government capable of direct relief on its own within the next 6 months and how the international community handles this may reflect a changing approach towards humanitarian relief efforts and human security.

Scenes of Devastion in Haiti

This week one story has dominated the news cycle - the horrible devastation of Haiti as the result of an earthquake. Right now, aid workers and citizens are beginning the long road to recovery with the help of international aid and military personnel. However, the plight of Haiti didn't begin here and recovery efforts will be hampered, to an even greater degree than in Indonesia, by the poverty and history of civil conflict that has made the country the poorest in Latin America. The question of how Haiti will move forward from here is a pressing one - the short answer is not without a huge outpouring of foreign assistance that will be maintained for years to come.

Why should the outside world care though? Haiti has had a messy past few decades and the US, UN and neighbouring countries have all intervened in governmental affairs. The latest incident was in 2004 when the US moved to oust the democratically elected dictator Aristide. Since then, the UN and Brazil have set up missions and peacekeeping forces, slowly beginning to stabilize the crushingly poor state. Haiti's poverty stems from several factors including a long history of unstable governance, poor infrastructure, desertification, heavy deforestation (which has meant erosion and flooding), and high levels of corruption.

At this point though, the need to aid millions without homes, proper sanitation or food is dire and the international community is right to act immediately and without reservation. Beyond obliging a sense of common humanity, leaving millions of people in such a state is a massive security risk. We are already seeing reports of violence surrounding aid drops, looting, massive exodus' into neighbouring states, and fears regarding escaped criminals. However, these concerns will soon be compounded if aid resources are not distributed efficiently, shelter is not built quickly and jobs not created. Aid agencies are already working under the assumption they will be completely supporting some Haitians for up to three years but even that's a daunting figure when considering the amount of work that will be needed to stabilize such an impoverished nation. Leaving it alone will lead to a failed state with rampant crime, corruption, poverty and ever growing populations of displace persons and refugees.

Interestingly, Canada is now considering fast-tracking some refugee claims from the country. Haitians already have a huge diaspora with some 100000 estimated to be in Canada, 600000 in the US and 800000 in the Dominican Republic. These numbers are unsurprising given the conditions in the country and the support of this community will be beneficial to a country brought to its knees so soon after achieving just a small measure of progress.

From the point of view of the UN, the Haitian earthquake has been personally devastating. The UN headquarters in Port-Au-Prince have been flattened and there are 46 UN workers dead with over 300 missing. In one good news story yesterday, a Danish UN worker was pulled from the ruined headquarters and is in stable condition. Hundreds of aid workers, including many from Canada, are now unlikely to be found alive. The high death rates of foreign nationals reflect the sheer amount of aid work that was going on before the earthquake and is a terrible reminder for many organizations, families and communities of the risks their members undertake on these missions.

Let us all hope that the current outpouring of support for the country will be enough to put it on the road to recovery and sustain it for the next several years as people rebuild their shattered lives. Let us also hope we will see improved coordination of the massive long term aid effort, even as thousands of troops from Canada, the US, and neighbouring states, land in Haiti. Disaster relief on this scale has rarely been seen.

Articles of interest on Haiti from:
- The Globe and Mail (Pictures, Articles, World Aid)
- The Economist (Why the World Must Respond)
- The Wall Street Journal (More Peacekeepers going to Haiti)

New Delegate Resources Available!

Background papers are up on our website! Go to www.ualberta.ca/~hsmun and then use the left-hand sidebar to navigate to your committee page.

Also, check out the first edition of the UNN newspaper!

Holiday's over...

Happy New Year and welcome back to regularly scheduled blogging by the HSMUN team. We're looking forward to the next month and a half of final preparations for the conference and hope you are too. Over the next few days we will be posting background papers, the first edition of the UNN, and hopefully sending out the first of our delegate emails.

Below are a few articles and events of interest:

• Counting their blessings - The Economist: This article looks at how developing countries weathered the economic crisis

• Yemen has become the latest terrorist-harboring state, with violent consequences. Reports from the NYT, Al Jazeera, and the BBC.

"Hillary Mann-Leverett, a former US diplomat who worked at the national security council, told Al Jazeera that Yemen had long been a troubled state plagued by poverty and violence.

"The most important thing here for geopolitics globally and within the region, is that Yemen has been a fractured, desperately poor and deeply fractitious country that all the countries in the region and the superpowers have used as a battleground," she said." - Al Jazeera

• Latest report from the International Crisis Group: 6 actual or potential conflicts deteriorated, none improved.
• How to write about poor people (Part 1 and part 2) - William Easterly: A humorous blog entry from a foreign aid scholar
  
• All the President's Leaks - FP.com: Why Obama is winning the propaganda war with Iran

Now go out and research my friends! (And check your committee blogs, too)


Cartoon from KAL at The Economist