There are no better experts on refugees than refugees

Report from The Guardian - guardian.org
By Saeed Kamali Dehghan
Dated Monday, 9 October 2023; 06.00 BST - here is a full copy:

‘There are no better experts on refugees than refugees’: Nhial Deng on why politicians need to listen

At 11, the South Sudanese refugee was forced to flee his Ethiopian village and spent several years in Kakuma camp in Kenya. His work helping others there won UN recognition and a prestigious award – now he’s planning to fund a library

Nhial Deng’s incredible journey culminated last month in receiving a prestigious UN prize recognising 14 years of helping other refugees. Photograph: Courtesy of Chegg.org

The militiamen came early in the morning when the children were sleeping. The serenity of Itang, an Ethiopian village on the Baro River skirting a national park close to the South Sudanese border, was about to be broken.

Eleven-year-old Nhial Deng heard gunshots and screaming as his father woke him up, whispering to him that there was only time to pack a shirt, a pen and a bottle of water.

“He brought me outside the house and pointed to a group of mostly women and children and a few men who were gathering under a small tree and told me that I had to go with them to a refugee camp,” says Deng, now 24, recalling the events of April 2010.

“I couldn’t move. I saw houses burning, I saw someone on the ground bleeding, people were running in all directions,” he says. “Someone came and pulled me to the group – I never even had a chance to say goodbye to my dad.”

That day was the start of an incredible journey for Deng, which culminated in him receiving a prestigious prize from the United Nations last month that recognised his work over the past 14 years in helping other refugees.

Deng was born in Ethiopia, where his father settled having fled South Sudan years before, but “it never came to my mind that one day [the conflict] would be something that would affect me directly”, Deng remembers.

It took the group two days to get to another village south of their own, where people divided into two groups. Deng’s group headed to the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. After a two-week journey on foot and on the back of trucks, he eventually made it to the camp in north-west Kenya, which today is home to more than 200,000 refugees.

Deng says he was scared and shivering throughout the journey but had hope because “my dad told me while he was holding me that I would be able to go to school – from a very young age my dad told me that education was a tool that I could use to transform my life.”

A pastor took Deng in as part of a fostered family programme and within a few months, he was registered at school.

“I felt at home when I started going to school,” he says. “The school was more than a place of learning for me, it was a place where I was able to find solace, where I was able to find hope, where I was able to find healing.”

Refugees from South Sudan register at Kakuma camp in Kenya. Photograph: Thomas Mukoya/Reuters

Kakuma refugee camp was set up in the early 1990s when thousands of Sudanese children, known as the “lost boys of Sudan”, flocked to safety after a civil war.

The sense of community that I experienced in the refugee camp is something that I have not seen anywhere else

“Life in the camp was just incredible,” Deng says. “The sense of community that I experienced in the refugee camp is something I have not seen anywhere else. You’ll see people who have their own challenges who would struggle day in, day out, but would hold on to each other.”

The Red Cross family-tracking programme managed to locate Deng’s family after four years – a two-minute phone call reunited him with his parents in 2014. Initial attempts to find his father failed because he had relocated to South Sudan, but the Red Cross found the family after they returned to Ethiopia.

It was only last year that Deng was able to meet with his mother and six siblings, who now live in Kenya. He has yet to see his father, who is still in Ethiopia, in person.

In 2017, Deng set up the Refugee Youth Peace Ambassadors, a group that started as a Wednesday club at his school and then expanded to other schools providing mentorship and creating workshops.

In 2018, Deng – who identifies as a South Sudanese refugee – graduated from the school, and later took a one-year online course with Regis University in the US, before being admitted on a full scholarship to Huron University in Ontario, Canada, where he moved in 2021 to study global studies and communications.

Deng went back to Kakuma refugee camp in 2021 to set up a new initiative called SheLeads Kakuma, aimed at empowering women and girls through a six-month leadership, advocacy and mentorship programme.

Nhial Deng speaks at the UN’s Transforming Education summit. Photograph: Jaclyn Licht/UN Photo

The UN has recognised Deng’s work helping other refugees. He was invited to speak on the sidelines of the UN general assembly in New York last month, where he was named the winner of a global student prize worth $100,000 (£82,500). The judges of the Chegg.org Global Student Prize chose him from almost 4,000 students in 122 countries.

“Nhial has overcome unimaginable adversity to keep fighting for a better future, not just for himself, but for thousands like him. In times of crisis, we need innovation and resilience, and Nhial’s commitment to tackling the global refugee crisis is truly inspirational,” said Heather Hatlo Porter, the chief communications officer of Chegg.

Deng has promised to donate half of his prize money to build a library at Kakuma refugee camp.

The UN refugee agency said in June that an estimated 108 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide by the end of last year – the number of refugees rose by a record 35% to reach 34.6 million. Politicians and media, Deng says, “need to talk more with refugees than about refugees”.

“I think no one can tell your story better than yourself. There are no better experts about the refugee issue than refugees and that’s why we need to listen to refugees.”

Deng is critical of how some developed countries disregard “the underlying principle of responsibility sharing” in the UN refugee convention.

Deng now helps young people in refugee camps to improve their lives through education and sport. He is particularly passionate about gender equality and misinformation. Photograph: Courtesy of Chegg.org

“More refugees are staying in countries neighbouring them. Over 70% of refugees actually stay in the developing world, in the global south,” he says, adding that Kenya hosts more than 600,000 refugees and Uganda more than a million.

“They [developed countries] don’t see the bigger picture, but also politicians turn refugees into a political football. They use that for their own gain. Numbers are often manufactured or they are exaggerated in some way. The reality is that a big number of refugees live in the developing world and [host] countries are not getting the credit at all.

“It’s incredible that from the first time in 1991 when the first group of refugees arrived in Kenya, Kenya has not closed its borders to refugees. It’s been open throughout.”

Asked about the potential of refugees, he says: “I think everyone has something to do. Everyone can contribute in some small way.”

View original: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2023/oct/09/there-are-no-better-experts-on-refugees-than-refugees-nhial-deng-on-why-politicians-need-to-listen

[Ends]

"It is an honor for us to be chosen by God to be alive at this time in history." - Joyce Meyer, 9th October 2023

— Joyce Meyer (@JoyceMeyer) Monday October 9, 2023  

Further reading

http://joycemeyer.org/ea  

"Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:" (Matthew 7:7 KJV)

[Ends]

Pope focuses on Darfur-born St. Josephine Bakhita, patron saint of Sudan and human trafficking survivors

Report from Catholic News Agency - catholicnewsagency.com
By Matthew Santucci
Vatican City

Dated Wednesday, 11 October 2023, 09:30 am - here is a copy in full:

Pope Francis highlights St. Josephine Bakhita’s example of forgiveness

Josephine Bakhita. | A.Currell via Flickr (CC BY NC 2.0)

Speaking in his first general audience since the start of the Synod on Synodality last week, Pope Francis on Wednesday resumed his ongoing catechesis on the theme of apostolic zeal, this time focusing on the story of the Sudanese-Italian saint Josephine Bakhita, which he described as “an existential parable of forgiveness.”

Born in 1869 in the region of Darfur, Josephine was sold into slavery as a young girl. She was traded between different owners and endured incredible hardship, being forcibly converted to Islam and was subjected to scarification, a process by which the skin is intentionally cut, or branded, to make a set pattern. Incidentally, her captors gave her the name Bakhita, which from the Arabic translates to “fortunata,” or fortunate. 

In 1883 she was sold to Italian Vice Consul Callisto Legnani. In 1884, following the political instability that had engulfed Khartoum, they fled Sudan to Italy. She was subsequently passed to Augusto Michieli, a friend of Legnami. She first encountered Catholicism when she was entrusted to the care of Canossian Sisters in Venice. 

While Micheli tried to force her back to Sudan with him, she refused. Her case went before the Italian court, which ultimately ruled that her slavery was null, given that Britain had outlawed slavery before she was sold and it was never legal in Italy. On Jan. 9, 1890, as a free woman, she converted to Catholicism, and nine years later, in 1896, made her final vows with the Canossian Sisters. Bakhita was canonized on Oct. 1, 2000, by Pope John Paul II and is the patron saint of Sudan and human trafficking survivors.  

It was the sisters’ example of kindness and charity that so profoundly touched Bakhita, ultimately leading to her conversion, and was the catalyst for her religious vocation but also instilled in her the evangelical imperative of forgiveness. 

She famously said: “If I were to meet those who kidnapped me, and even those who tortured me, I would kneel and kiss their hands. For, if these things had not happened, I would not have been a Christian and a religious today.” 

Her life, which was characterized by hardship but also hope and mercy, was the backdrop for Pope Francis’ appeal for forgiveness, which he said stems from God’s love. He quoted an excerpt from Luke’s Gospel (Lk 23:34): “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.”

Pope Francis pauses during his general audience on Oct. 11, 2023, in St. Peter's Square. Credit: Vatican Media

“What is the secret of St. Bakhita?” the pope asked, adding: “The vocation of the oppressed is that of freeing themselves and their oppressors, becoming restorers of humanity. Only in the weakness of the oppressed can the force of God’s love, which frees both, be revealed.” 

The pope went on to say that “to pity means both to suffer with the victims of the great inhumanity in the world and also to pity those who commit errors and injustices, not justifying, but humanizing.” 

“When we enter the logic of struggle, of division between us, of bad feelings, one against the other, we lose humanity. And many times we think that we need humanity, to be more human. And this is the work that St. Bakhita teaches us: to humanize, to humanize ourselves and to humanize others,” the Holy Father said, departing from his prepared remarks.

Throughout his address the pope emphasized that forgiveness is an essential component of Christian life. It is what enabled St. Josephine Bakhita to become “a free, joyful woman, capable of loving.”

In this way she stands as a model of not only living God’s love authentically, the pope said, but also “helps us to unmask our hypocrisies and selfishness, to overcome resentments and conflicts. She encourages us to reconcile with ourselves and find peace in our families and communities. She offers us a light of hope in these difficult times of mistrust and distrust of others.” 

Full story: https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/255647/pope-francis-st-josephine-bakhita-forgiveness

[Ends]

Pope Francis prayed for Sudan in St. Peter's Square: Love, forgiveness liberate, break cycles of violence

Report from National Catholic Reporter - ncronline.org

By Cindy Wooden

Catholic News Service - Vatican City

Dated Wednesday, 11 October 2023 - here is a full copy:

Love, forgiveness liberate, break cycles of violence, pope says

Pope Francis greets a child as he rides in the popemobile around St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican before his weekly general audience Oct. 11. (CNS/Lola Gomez)

The life of St. Josephine Bakhita, a former slave from Sudan who became a nun, demonstrates how love liberates people from oppression and frees them to forgive their oppressors and break cycles of hatred and violence, Pope Francis said.

"Often a wounded person wounds in turn; the oppressed easily becomes an oppressor," the pope said Oct. 11 at his weekly general audience in St. Peter's Square.

In contrast, he said, St. Bakhita teaches people that "forgiveness takes away nothing but adds dignity to the person; it makes us lift our gaze from ourselves toward others, to see them as fragile as we are, yet always brothers and sisters in the Lord."

Continuing a series of audience talks highlighting saints who demonstrate zeal or passion for evangelization, Francis said St. Bakhita's life story shows how "forgiveness is the wellspring of a zeal that becomes mercy and calls us to a humble and joyful holiness."

The pope also used the occasion to pray for peace in Sudan, where a power struggle unleashed violence in April and fighting continues although, as he noted, very little is said about it in the news.

St. Bakhita, who lived 1869-1947, was abducted and enslaved at the age of 7. "She suffered cruelty and violence: on her body she bore more than a hundred scars," the pope said.

And yet, she wrote, "I never despaired, because I felt a mysterious force supporting me."

Later she was given a crucifix — the first thing she ever owned — and, the pope said, "looking at it, she experienced a profound inner liberation, because she felt understood and loved and therefore capable of understanding and loving in turn. This is how it begins. One feels understood, loved and is then able to understand and love others."

Having compassion, he said, "means suffering with the victims of the many forms of inhumanity present in the world as well as pitying those who commit errors and injustices -- not justifying them, but humanizing them."

"When we enter into the logic of conflict, division among us, bad feelings, one against another, we lose humanity," the pope said. But St. Bakhita teaches that the solution is "to humanize, humanize ourselves and humanize others," by forgiving them and giving them another chance.

"Forgiveness liberated her," the pope said. "Forgiveness first received through God's merciful love, and then the forgiveness given that made her a free, joyful woman, capable of loving."

View original: https://www.ncronline.org/vatican/vatican-news/love-forgiveness-liberate-break-cycles-violence-pope-says

[Ends]

EU opposes total siege of Gaza: Israel cutting water, food, electricity to civilians violates international law

EU foreign ministers are urging both sides to respect humanitarian law. “That means no blockage of water, food or electricity to the civil population in Gaza,” said EU Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell. Read more.

Report from BBC News Live Reporting

By SOFIA BETTIZA

Reporting from Brussels Tue 10 Oct 2023, 19:54 BST - here is a copy in full:

EU foreign policy chief suggests Israel is violating international law

EU Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell has said the bloc opposes a total siege of Gaza.

“Israel has the right to defend itself, but that needs to be done accordingly with international law, humanitarian law. And some decisions are contrary to international law.”

Borrell spoke after an emergency meeting of EU foreign ministers.

“Some actions – like cutting electricity and food for civilians – are against international law,” he said.

EU foreign ministers are urging both sides to respect humanitarian law. “That means no blockage of water, food or electricity to the civil population in Gaza,” said Borrell.

He stressed that the EU considered Hamas a terrorist organisation, but that the Palestinian Authority was a different thing.

“Not all Palestinian people are terrorists. So a collective punishment would be unfair and unproductive. It would be against our interests, and against the interest of peace.”

To view the original click here.

[Ends]