Posted By: Erica G. WASHINGTON, DC – I received an email recently from a friend in Afghanistan who helps develop local girls’ schools. She got a call from the family of a community elder who had assisted her in establishing a school for 200 girls in Taliban-heavy Logar province. The family said a week before…
Posted By: Sarah We wouldn’t usually be involved in the planning of a military operation, not in the real world. And yet here we are at Ft. Leavenworth role playing an NGO, with access to everyone from Special Ops and logistical support teams to the Commanding General. It’s a tribute to the US military and…
Posted By: Marla B Sarah and I are here at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas this week at the Army Command and General Staff College (CGSC). CGSC is a leading educational and intellectual center for the Army in developing leaders for full spectrum joint, interagency and multinational operations. We were invited to participate in a training exercise…
Posted by: Erica KABUL, AFGHANISTAN – This week I’ve had a lot of meetings at the Kabul headquarters for the NATO mission here, ISAF. Everyone in Kabul, but especially the military types, are humming about a new “comprehensive strategy” for Afghanistan. A quick survey of the event coverage and op-ed sections of most US newspapers…
GAZA – I trekked across the Sinai Peninsula after watching the fighting from the Armistice line for a few weeks in December and January. Israel wouldn’t let human rights monitors into Gaza, so I decided to take my team of researchers in through Egypt once the fighting stopped. I’ve been to Gaza twice before –…
KABUL, Afghanistan – I’ve written generally in the last few blogs about the compensation and victim assistance issues that CIVIC analyzed in our recent report. Let’s take a concrete example of the type of harm and redress we’re talking about. A few months ago, I met several families who lost relatives and friends in a…
KABUL, Afghanistan – I arrived back in Kabul this week. With the snow already melting, many fear that spring – and with it a spring offensive by the Taliban – is already on its way. If past years are any guide, those bearing the lasting costs of an escalation in the conflict will be the…
KABUL, Afghanistan – For the last year, I have been living in Afghanistan interviewing civilians harmed in the conflict for the Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict (CIVIC). We spoke with 143 survivors of airstrikes, suicide bombings, IEDs, convoy shootings, and other incidents of war. What they told me, as well as what more than…
Posted by: Erica KABUL – I was in Pakistan recently, looking at the situation of victims of conflict on the other side of the border. In the past few months, the number of US Predator strikes into the tribal areas of Pakistan from across the border in Afghanistan have skyrocketed. (See this Washington Post article).…