Article: In a rugged part of the world, help needed now and far beyond

Posted by: James Hathaway

From the Manchester Journal in Manchester, VT:

Since 2007 Clear Path has constructed 25 handicap access ramps at 13 different schools in Kabul, the capital city, and provided training about the rights of the disabled. It has established the Afghan Mine Action Technology Center, which employs disabled Afghans to produce equipment for de-mining efforts. The center also brings state-of-the-art prosthetic devices to those who need them

Read the rest of this article on Clear Path International in Afghanistan here.

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Dutch Charity "Stichting Mensenkinderen" Awards $140,000 to Clear Path International

Posted by: James Hathaway

HARDERWIJK, Netherlands - The Dutch charity "Stichting Mensenkinderen" (www.mensenkinderen.nl) has given a grant for 100,000 Euro ($140,000) to Clear Path International for its humanitarian mine action work in Vietnam and Cambodia.

About two-thirds of the grant will be used to help match $127,000 in funding for Vietnam from the U.S. Department of State's Office of Weapons Removal & Abatement, while the remainder will be used as a match for the $50,000 provided by WRA for CPI's rice mill enterprise for landmine accident survivors in Cambodia.

"Several thousand landmine victims, family members and persons with disabilities will benefit from the grants by Mensenkinderen and State," said Imbert Matthee, CPI's executive director. "It means that our much-needed work in Southeast Asia can go on in a difficult fundraising environment. We're extremely grateful for this."

Stichting Mensenkinderen (literally translated as "the Foundation for Children" or "the Foundation for Human Children") was founded in 2003 by television producer Sipke van der Land. Since it began, the organization has focused on providing food, shelter, vocational training and other services to disadvantaged, disabled and orphaned children in Albania, Moldavia and Bulgaria.

The last two years, the charity has expanded its interest to include other regions of the world. In 2007 and 2008, it gave donor-advised grants to CPI for its work along the Thai-Burma border.

In Vietnam, the Mensenkinderen funds will be used to continue Clear Path's aid to landmine accident survivors and family members in the central region (north and south of the former Demilitarized Zone) where they receive everything from emergency medical care and prostheses to home improvement and income-generating grants.

In Cambodia, the Dutch grant money will go to help expand CPI's current network of farmers' coops and to provide services to amputee farmers in the poor communities around its rice mill in Battambang province on the border with Thailand.

Like Clear Path, Stichting Mensenkinderen has a small staff and office while relying heavily on volunteers.

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US State Department Funds Clear Path International Programs in Vietnam & Cambodia

Posted by: James Hathaway

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The U.S. Department of State's Office of Weapons Removal & Abatement has approved matching grants totaling $177,000 for Clear Path International's humanitarian mine action programs in Vietnam and Cambodia.

The largest grant of $127,000 will be used to fund efforts that assist survivors of accidents with landmines and unexploded ordnance (UXO) in central Vietnam. The second grant of $50,000 will be used for CPI's rice mill enterprise for landmine survivors in Battambang, Cambodia, where its beneficiaries receive training, microcredit and crop processing services.

The two grants are matched by financial contributions from the private sector, including the McKnight Foundation of Minneapolis, the Johnson & Widdifield Charitable Trust, the Seattle-based law firm Marler Clark and the Dutch charity Stichting Mensenkinderen.

"At a time when it's challenging to raise money from private-sector sponsors, the government's steady and ongoing support of our work helps sustain vital survivor assistance programs," says Imbert Matthee, CPI's executive director. "It also inspires private charities to keep giving despite the economic downturn."

At least 1,000 landmine accident survivors, their family members and disadvantaged members of their communities will benefit from the two grants in the remainder of 2009 and the first part of 2010, Matthee says.

In Vietnam, aid to survivors comes in the form of emergency medical care, prosthetics, physical rehabilitation, income-generating assistance, animal husbandry programs, scholarships and sports activities.

In Cambodia, CPI and its local partner, Cambodian Volunteers for Community Development, will expand the cooperative of amputee farmers, boost micro-credit lending, offer training, mill and sell their rice.

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Destination Cambodia | Clear Path International Sends Its 73rd Overseas Medical Shipment

Posted by: Imbert Matthee

REDMOND, Wash. - As part of its ongoing effort to strengthen local health care in mine-affected countries, Clear Path International has sent its 73rd container of relief goods collected from donors in the Seattle area.

The 40-foot container shipment destined for Phnom Penh, Cambodia, included 234 items ranging from hospital beds and wheelchairs to surgical supplies and diagnostic equipment with a total value of more than $50,000.

The items were donated by Emerald Heights, a retirement community in Redmond; Group Health Cooperative in Seattle; Care Manor, a nursing facility in Gig Harbor; and Martha & Mary's, a retirement home in Poulsbo.

Clear Path has had a program to assist landmine accident survivors in Cambodia since 2002. It is currently operating a rice mill in the heavily mine province of Battambang near the border with Thailand, where it helps hundreds of landmine victims with farm training, microcredit, rice processing and sales.

The medical shipment will be received and distributed throughout Cambodia by the Volunteer Association of Medical Professional in Phnom Penh headed by Dr. Muoy Sroy. A special thanks to the staff of Emerald Heights and CPI volunteers Brent Olsen, Howard Hanners and John Anderson.

Staff from Emerald Heights help CPI load its 73rd container of medical relief goods.

CPI volunteer Brent Olsen (wearing a white T-shirt) and staff from Emerald Heights stack hospital beds into the container for Cambodia.

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Noted War Photographer Alixandra Fazzina Documents Clear Path International's Work in Afghanistan

Posted by: James Hathaway

KABUL, Afghanistan - A bearded tribal elder awaiting his new prosthesis with a look of "Inshallah." A downcast girl in a red dress against a blue wall, her dark eyes pained from the struggle to use a walker. A hospitalized young man whose naked upper limbs contort like the wing bones of a wounded bird.

The images linger in your mind even hours after you've seen them. Such is the power of Alixandra Fazzina's extraordinary photography and in this case, her subjects are patients at the Kabul Orthopedic Organization. KOO gets a major portion of its funding from Clear Path International under a subcontract with DynCorp International, which in turn is supported by the U.S. State Department's Office of Weapons Removal & Abatement.

Fazzina, a noted war photographer who grew up in the United Kingdom, spent an entire day documenting the work of CPI's partner adjacent to the main military hospital in Kabul. The 33-year-old, dubbed a "hot star" by the British Independent newspaper, has spent a decade visually recording conflicts around the world. Her subjects have included the infamous Lord's Resistance Army In Uganda, the Miya-Miya rebels in the Congo, and the aftermath of wars in Sierra Leone and Bosnia.

More than 6,000 KOO patients like the ones photographed by Fazzina received care through the clinic's partnership with CPI in 2007 and 2008. Persons with disabilities, especially landmine accident survivors, come from all over Afghanistan to be treated there. Stay tuned for more of Alixandra's photos, as she recently visited Jalalabad Afghanistan where CPI sponsors Afghanistan's only cricket club, made up of persons with disabilities.

Injured in a landmine explosion, an old man receives heat treatment on his leg during a physiotherapy session at the Kabul Orthepedic Organisation (KOO).

A female patient uses an exercise bicycle to help her gain use of her legs during physiotherapy at the Kabul Orthepedic Centre.

Waiting in a corridor between consultations, a young land mine victim looks at a new prosthetic leg propped up on a bench.

With the aid of a frame, a young girl learns to walk on prosthetic limbs at the Kabul Orthepedic Organisation's clinic for children.

Head of the Kabul Orthepedic Organisation's workshops Muhammad Ghous helps amputee Sher Muhammad walk on a new prosthetic leg for the first time. Having lost his leg in a landmine explosion when he was fighting with the Mujahadeen in Kunduz, Sher is receiving his first "lighter and stronger"; prostheses.

Surrounded by other war wounded, an Afghan National Army soldier is assessed by a doctor having has his shattered leg bone screwed together.

Recently married with a new born baby, twenty-six year old soldier Muhammad Naeem spends his third month as a bed-ridden quadriplegic after sustaining a head injury in a landmine blast.

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Thanks for Everything, Lobke: Dutch Clear Path International Representative in Thailand Moves to Spain

Posted by: James Hathaway

After nearly four years as a volunteer Country Representative for Clear Path International on the Thai-Burma border, Dutch physical therapist Lobke Dijkstra has moved to Spain to start an organization providing recreational opportunities for persons with disabilities.

Dijkstra, who spent at least several months a year in Thailand on leave from her regular job as a PT in the Netherlands, leaves behind a legacy of services now available to landmine accident survivors up and down the long western border of Thailand.

For the 2009 - 2010 cycle, CPI is expecting to assist at least 477 survivors with everything from prosthetics care, full-time nursing care (for blind amputees) and income-generating projects for refugee amputees. The program, now under the direction of CPI's new SE Asia director, melody Mociulski, serves beneficiaries from the Karen, Karenni and Shan ethnic states in Burma in seven different locations.

In a note copied to all CPI staff and directors, Board President Nancy Norton sent a "Certificate of Appreciation" to Dijkstra and said "Our organization and the people we help have been immeasurably blessed by your extraordinary volunteer efforts during the past several years. Your compassion, dedication and perseverance have allowed us to assist hundreds of landmine accident survivors from Burma whose needs would have gone unfulfilled. By your selflessness, your devotion and your boundless energy we are all deeply humbled."

In response to the note, Dijkstra said she learned a lot from her time on the Thai-Burma border and that her work was a chance to fulfill her childhood dream of working in development overseas.

"I want to thank CPI for its trust in me and I'm grateful to all who put their energy into this much-needed work year in, year out," she said.

Read Lobke's blog posting about working on the Thai Burma Border, "My Own Two Hands", here.

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CPI Starts Year of the Buffalo with Pig-breeding Project For Landmine Accident Survivors in Vietnam's Gio Linh

Posted by: Tran Hong Chi

GIO LINH, CENTRAL VIETNAM -- In the new lunar Year of the Buffalo, Clear Path in Vietnam began its activities supporting landmine and bomb accident with a pig-raising project in the coastal commune of Gio Hai in Quang Tri Province's Gio Linh District.

Gio Linh District is among the spots in central Vietnam most heavily contaminated by unexploded ordnance (UXO). Fourteen of its 20 communes have confirmed or suspected contamination levels and it’s the site of regular accidents. In humanitarian mine action “speak,” Gio Linh is considered 98 percent contaminated.
Twenty of Gio Hai commune's 44 poorest households affected by bomb accidents were selected for the pig-breeding project by a Clear Path outreach worker through home assessment visits and interviews probing their capacity to succeed in the program. CPI works closely with the local People’s Committee.

Project beneficiaries review their commitment documents before submitting them to CPI. (Photo by Tran Hong Chi)

Last year, Gio Hai was classified by the government as a "Commune Faced with Extreme Difficulties." Fishing is the main source of income here. Only men go out in small boats to fish along its shore. In the sandy fields behind the dunes, peanuts and sweet potatoes struggle to grow against the elements: frequent floods in the monsoon season and sand moving around in the dry season. These tough conditions explain why half the people here don’t have steady jobs. According to the People's Committee, hundreds of people from Gio Hai leave every year for seasonal jobs elsewhere.
Vo Quang Kha, 42, was selected as a project participant from Gio Hai's Village 4. Kha lost his left leg almost up to his hip when he was only 9. A cluster bomb exploded when he was raking trash in his schoolyard. For long, Kha struggled with his disability and living conditions. Kha lives in a household of three generations and seven people: His parents, who are in their seventies, his wife and their three children ages 14, 13 and 10. Kha's wife is the family's sole breadwinner. For this reason and despite his old age, Kha's mute father still goes out fishing at times to share the workload with his daughter-in-law. His oldest son, who weighs just 44 pounds, looks like a primary school boy. With so many disabled, weak and dependent members, the family barely subsists. Seven people share less than US $2 for food every day, not counting rice.

Mr. Kha enjoys a ride with CPI to attend training course. (Photo by Tran Hong Chi)

Participating in this pig-raising project, beneficiary households like Mr. Kha's receive training from a district agriculture officer; a CPI grant ranging from $41 to $59 to upgrade their old pigsty or build a new one. And, each household receives $6 to vaccinate their new piglets. And the piglets? CPI gives each household a $70 loan to buy three to four piglets without interest. The households have to pay back the loan after a year. They can make two annual installments: after six months and after a year. This is called a revolving loan fund because the money paid back by the families is used for new candidates in new project areas.

Kha's family once raised a sow. When it got old they sold it, but not for enough to buy a new breeding pig. That was almost two years ago. Now with the first grant from CPI, Kha has already put a new roof on his old pigsty and plans to build a new section. He and his wife intend to buy a sow of about 20 lbs for breeding and three piglets to raise for meat in the short term.
Despite the modest size of the grant, this assistance opens new opportunities for families like Kha's. It creates work for people with disabilities and boosts their household income. Kha is a confident participant in the project, saying that his wife has experience raising pigs and CPI's support will help kick-start his household economy. For Kha, the program is also of moral support to him, as he has never received any assistance before as a bomb accident survivor.

Started as a pilot project in Vinh Linh district (Quang Tri Province) in 2004, the pig-raising model has proven to be a success. After Vinh Linh and Cam Lo, Gio Linh is the third district where CPI brings this assistance to households affected by accidents with unexploded ordnance (UXO).

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Clear Path International Releases Annual Report

Posted by: Imbert Matthee

In a one-year period, Clear Path International assisted more than 9,400 landmine accident survivors, persons with disabilities and members of their families in five countries, as you can read in our 2007 – 2008 annual report.

The number of 2007 – 2008 beneficiaries is more than CPI served in its entire history since 2000. It stems largely from our new Afghanistan operation and from a record number of bomb survivors assisted in Vietnam during the period. CPI’s other program activities are in Cambodia, Thailand and just inside Burma.

In the period covered by the report, we have assisted 6,325 beneficiaries in Afghanistan, 1,679 in Vietnam, 929 in Cambodia and 538 on both sides of the Thai-Burma border.

The report covers the breadth of services CPI offers, ranging from prosthetic care and physical therapy to vocational skills training and support for sports activities. We've raised nearly $1.3 million in 2007 – 2008 and spent $878,950, or 87.2 percent, of its operating expenses on program services.
Download a copy of Clear Path International's 2007 – 2008 Annual Report here.

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Clear Path International Beneficiaries in Vietnam Become Deminers Thanks to Mines Advisory Group

Posted by: Tran Hong Chi

DONG HA, Vietnam -- As part of its partnership with Clear Path International, Mines Advisory Group in Vietnam has started to recruit CPI-supported landmine accident survivors or their family members to train them as clearance technicians.

The latest person to benefit from this project is 31-year-old Mrs. Tran Thi Hanh from Hoan Cat Village, Cam Lo District, Quang Tri Province. The mother of two children, aged six and 11, has been looking after them and her husband, Nguyen Van Nam, 33, who was injured while collecting war scrap metal two years ago. Mr. Nam still has metal shrapnel embedded in his body from a mortar fuse that exploded in 2005 while he was digging it up. He also received shrapnel wounds to his hands, eyes and chest, and is no longer able to work for a living.

CPI and MAG condemn the dangerous economic pursuit of reclaiming wartime ordnance for resale as scrap metal but some financially marginal Vietnamese families cannot resist the instant cash they can earn from their freelance activities. Although survivors such as Mr. Nam aren’t considered “innocent” victims of unexploded ordnance accidents, their family members are.

“My husband was a scrap collector and can now no longer work as a normal person,” says Mrs. Hanh. “He just does the easy house work, grows sweet potatoes and takes the children to school.”

She added: “Before his accident, he used to go out with his detector at 6am and return home at 6pm after selling the scrap metal.”

From this potentially lethal occupation, Mr. Nam brought home VND30,000 (USD1.87) a day, which was added to the income Mrs. Hanh made from in farming. This supplumentaryl income dried up shortly after Mr. Nam was injured despite CPI’s coverage of his medical bills.

As the main breadwinner of the Hanh family, Mrs. Hanh was selected by CPI for the MAG’s deminer recruitment program. Where possible, MAG attempts to recruit landmine accident survivors as deminers but because of some of the survivors’ injuries and the physical requirements of work in a Mine Action Team (MAT), they aren’t able to take part in the training course. Sometimes, they can be employed in administrative positions.

“After the training, I returned home and in September MAG called me and offered me a job,” she said. “I love this work and will serve MAG until the end.”

Mrs. Hanh is one of eight CPI beneficiaries recommended to MAG for possible recruitment and training as professional deminers. From the list, MAG selected two for whom it had positions on its clearance teams.

Nineteen-year-old Duong Van Duy is another MAG recruit brought forward by CPI. Duong is the brother of a landmine accident survivor from a six-member family in Quang Trung Commune, Quang Trach District in Quang Binh Province.

“When I knew that I would be recruited by MAG I was so happy,” he says. “I was no longer unemployed. I will have a job…a good job and I want to share my happiness with my brother.”

Though he was the youngest in the MAG demining class, Duong turned out to be the best student, according to his supervisor, Mr. Tran Xuan Thang, who also said the young recruit “will be a good addition to our 100-strong technical workforce.”

Duong helped make his own community safer. MAG conducted mobile responses to sightings of unexploded ordnance in 9 out of the 15 communes in Quang Trach District, removed and destroyed 5,879 items, and cleared 3,400 square meters of land thus making it possible for new medical clinics, kindergartens, schools and homes to be built on de-contaminated land.

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Afghanistan: Better Access to Schools for Disabled Girls and Boys

Posted by: Imbert Matthee

KABUL, Afghanistan – It’s one thing to be disabled and face the kind of discrimination typical for anyone with a disability here. It’s another to be disabled girl and go to school in one of the most conservative Islamic countries in the world.

The last thing you need is to face physical barriers as well, particularly in a wheelchair.

That’s one of the reason Clear Path works closely with the Accessibility Organization for Afghan Disabled, a domestic charity that builds wheelchair ramps and provides other advocacy services for persons with disabilities in Afghanistan.

Since CPI began as a subcontractor of the U.S. State Department’s Office of Weapons Removal & Abatement through a prime contract with DynCorp International, it has funded the construction of 25 wheelchair ramps at 13 schools around Kabul, including several schools for girls.

It has also paid for the training of 40 teachers and principals in the rights of persons with disabilities and the creation of fully accessible computer train g room for the disabled.

The School Accessibility Initiative was conducted in accordance with The Government of Afghanistan’s Victim Assistance Plan of Action, known as the Kabul Report, to render at least ten percent of existing schools per year physically accessible to children with disabilities.

More than 640,000 Afghan are considered severely disabled with wheelchairs as the only means of physical mobility. To have any chance at securing meaningful employment in Afghanistan, children using wheelchairs need access to an education and means they need to be able to get into the building and the restrooms.

At Ariana, a Kabul high school for girls where CPI funded one of its first ramps for WRA, more than 80 girls with disabilities use wheelchairs and now have barrier-free access to the buildings thanks to the AOAD project.

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