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IN THIS ISSUE
1) "Thank You for Standing With KAIROS!"
2) The Robin Hood Tax
3) Stand Up for Human Rights in Colombia!
4) The Lubicon Cree
5) World Week for Peace in Israel Palestine
6) Dignity For All
7) MPs delay debate on responsible mining bill
8) Another step closer to climate action from Ottawa
FEATURE RESOURCE
Fueling Conflict: Canada, Oil & Human Rights
FEATURE PARTNER
Maurice Namwira, Director Héritiers de la Justice
IN BRIEF
1) Canadian Council of Churches & Evangelical Fellowship of Canada send letter to Minister Oda
2) Elections in Sudan: A Step Forward?
3) World Peoples’ Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth
REFLECTION
'Gratitude and Hope in Times of Crisis' - Mary Corkery, KAIROS Executive Director
THANK YOU FOR STANDING WITH KAIROS!
Big warm thanks to all who have sent in 'I Stand With KAIROS' photos!
We have pictures from across the country, of individuals, teams, churches, young and old ... and even a cat!
Have a look at our ever growing 'Stand With KAIROS' slideshow, and send us your best shot to photos@kairoscanada.org.!!
We'll post your photo just as soon as we can!
THE ROBIN HOOD TAX
A Tiny Tax That Will Do A World of Good.
KAIROS Calls for a Global Financial Transactions Tax
A Financial Transactions Tax (FTT) –a small levy on financial market transactions including equity, bond, derivative and foreign exchange trades– is one of the best ways to fund programs to fight climate change and world poverty, and make financial institutions pay their fair share of the costs of the global economic crisis.
During the week of April 19th KAIROS joined with partners from across Canada to launch a campaign to persuade leaders from the G20 to endorse an FTT –also known as the Robin Hood Tax– at their Summit in Toronto in June.
Check out KAIROS' online campaign for the Robin Hood Tax! >>
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For more information contact John Dillon,
Program Coordinator for Global Economic Justice
jdillon@kairoscanada.org
(416) 463-5312 x 231
(toll free 1-877-403-8933)
STAND UP FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN COLOMBIA!
On Wednesday, March 10, the Honourable Peter Van Loan, Minister of International Trade put forth Bill C-2, the Colombia-Canada Free Trade Agreement, as Parliament's first order of business. This bill is considered a top priority by the government. Previous proposed legislation, which had been the subject of much contention among MPs, died when the government prorogued Parliament.
Bill C-2 is now in the Standing Committee on International Trade. KAIROS continues to join the voices of partners, NGOs and social movements in Canada in calling for an independent impact assessment before the deal is implemented.
A KAIROS Urgent Action, with some excellent resources, a backgrounder, and a sample letter>>
Read further analysis on the proposed amendment to the Canada- Colombia Free Trade Agreement >>
World Council of Churches calls for a peaceful resolution of the Colombian conflict >>
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For more information contact Rachel Warden,
Latin America Partnerships Program Coordinator
rwarden@kairoscanada.org
(416) 463-5312 x 242
(toll free 1-877-403-8933)
THE LUBICON CREE
"Twenty years ago, on 26 March 1990, the United Nations Human Rights Committee (the Committee) ruled that Canada had violated the human rights of the Lubicon Cree, an Indigenous people who have lived for centuries in what is now the province of Alberta. The ruling was based on evidence that Canada had failed to recognize and protect Lubicon rights to their lands and that intensive oil and gas development had devastated the Lubicon economy and way of life...
...Twenty years later the Lubicon people continue to suffer from the same human rights violations that were condemned by the Committee in 1990."
Read the full article >>
Other Links:
Canadians should not lose sight of underlying injustices facing the Lubicon Cree of Northern Alberta:
A Joint Statement of KAIROS and Amnesty International >>
Request for the Reinstatement of Funds to the Aboriginal Healing Foundation - Petition >>
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For more information contact Ed Bianchi
Indigenous Rights Program Coordinator
ebianchi@kairoscanada.org
613-235-9956 x 221
(toll free 1-877-403-8933)
“OUR HOLY CITY AND OUR LAND ARE MUCH IN NEED OF PEACE.”
World Week for Peace in Israel Palestine, May 29 to June 4
For more than 40 years, Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem have been suffering under the Israeli occupation. Day-to-day life is interrupted by the separation wall, checkpoints, house demolitions, ever-expanding settlements, land seizures and inequitable water use policies. Human rights are denied through arbitrary arrests and an intricate web of bureaucratic rules and regulations limiting the most basic of freedoms. Israeli military actions and Palestinian attacks have caused far too many deaths and both sides live in uncertainty and fear.
In a time when hope seems all but gone, KAIROS joins the World Council of Churches in its worldwide call and invites congregations to take part in the World Week for Peace in Palestine Israel between May 29 and June 4, 2010. Join churches around the world in prayer and action for peace for Palestinians and Israelis: use the Jerusalem Prayer written by the heads of the Churches in Jerusalem in your services on Sunday, 30 May 2010.
View the World Council of Churches’ resource page for more information on how to get involved, and more liturgical resources, which will be posted soon.
We also invite you to have a look at KAIROS’ Countries of Concern: Palestine and Israel page for more information about our work in the region and our position regarding a just peace in Israel/Palestine.
For more information contact Maya Johnston
Middle East Partnerships Coordinator
mjohnston@kairoscanada.org
416-463-5312 ext. 239
We believe that freedom from poverty is a human right.
We believe in equality among all people.
We believe that everyone is entitled to social and economic security.
We believe in dignity for all!
We also believe that now is the time to end poverty in Canada.
These are the shared beliefs that form the basis of Dignity for All, a multi-year, multi-partner, non-partisan campaign launched May 2009 by Canada Without Poverty and Citizens for Public Justice. To date, 314 groups and 5070 Canadians have signed the Dignity for All call to action.
This campaign’s vision is to make a poverty-free and more socially secure and cohesive Canada a reality by 2020. The campaign has three goals:
1. A comprehensive, integrated federal plan for poverty elimination
2. A federal Act to eliminate poverty, promote social inclusion and strengthen social security
3. Sufficient federal revenue to invest in social security
KAIROS supports the call of the Dignity for All campaign for concrete and sustained action by the federal government to combat the structural causes of poverty in Canada. We invite you to visit www.dignityforall.ca to find out more about the campaign and how you, your congregation and your community can join the campaign for a poverty-free Canada.
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For more information on KAIROS’ involvement in the campaign or for information on our continued work on migrant justice, as a complementary strategy to fight poverty in Canada, contact:
Alfredo Barahona, Migrant & Indigenous Rights Program Coordinator, abarahona@kairoscanada.org,
416-463-5312 x251
(toll free 1-877-403-8933)
MPs DELAY DEBATE ON RESPONSIBLE MINING BILL
Liberal MP John McKay continues to face a barrage of criticism from Canada’s mining lobby over his modest bill to deny government financing to irresponsible mining operations. His private member’s bill, Bill C-300, will soon return for consideration by the Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee. Hearings have been delayed in recent weeks as the committee deals with other pressing matters, such the recent crisis at the federal human rights agency, Rights and Democracy. McKay continues to rally widespread support for his bill from faith-based groups, including KAIROS, as well as environmental, global justice, labour and human rights organizations. Two KAIROS representatives appeared before the committee last November to express church support for the bill and highlight the positive impact it could have for our global partners in developing countries.
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For more information, please contact:
Ian Thomson, Program Coordinator for Ecological Justice and Corporate Accountability
ithomson@kairoscanada.org
613-235-9956 ext 222,
(toll free 1-877-403-8933)
ANOTHER STEP CLOSER TO CLIMATE ACTION IN OTTAWA
This year, it seems that Earth Day came early in the House of Commons. On April 14th, Parliamentarians voted twice on what Canada must do to tackle climate change. MPs voted in favour of sending Bill C-311 (Climate Change Accountability Act), a private member’s bill that NDP MP Bruce Hyer first proposed in 2008, forward to receive its third and final reading at a later date. If enacted, the bill would require the government to develop a national climate action plan founded on science-based emission reduction targets.
The House also approved a motion from Liberal environment critic David McGuinty that criticized the government’s failure to implement greenhouse gas emission regulations since taking office in 2006 and urged it to show leadership and stop waiting for climate action from the U.S. Congress. His motion passed with the support of all opposition parties by a margin of 156-137.
KAIROS supports these initiatives for advacing several key demands of our Re-energize Campaign. Bill C-311 establishes that Canada must reduce its greenhouse gas emissions in accordance with science-based targets. The Liberal motion calls for urgently needed climate financing to developing countries and a phase-out of fossil fuel subsidies.
Click here for more information on Bill C-311, including results of the vote>>
Click here for more information on David McGuinty’s motion on climate change, including results of the vote >>
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For more information, please contact:
Ian Thomson, Program Coordinator for Ecological Justice and Corporate Accountability
ithomson@kairoscanada.org
613-235-9956 ext 222
or
Dorothy McDougall, Program Coordinator for Ecological Justice
dmcdougall@kairoscanada.org.
(416) 463-5312 x 222
(toll free 1-877-403-8933)
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FEATURE RESOURCE
FUELING CONFLICT:
Canada, Oil & Human Rights
A global map (160 x 102 cm) showing the connection between what’s in our gas tanks and human rights abuses around the world. This resource includes a fold-out map and "Canada's Oil Story". The map depicts highlighted countries where three criteria are present: oil is exported to Canada, major Canadian companies are present in the oil and gas sector, ongoing conflict or egregious human right abuses.
Cost: $7
To order:
contact Caroline Foster,
orders@kairoscanada.org 416-463-5312 /
1-877-403-8933 x 221.
FEATURE PARTNER
Maurice Namwira
(Democratic Republic of Congo)
Director:
Héritiers de la Justice >>
Maurice Namwira is the executive secretary of Héritiers de la Justice (HJ, Heirs of Justice) in Bukavu, South Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo, a KAIROS human rights partner. KAIROS supports HJ in delivering legal services to women victims of gender based violence related to conflict over mineral extraction (reported on in the Globe and Mail, March 15, 2010). HJ also trains the local public sector in the rule of law and fosters accountability of local government to citizens needs.
Read the Héritiers de la Jusitce (Heirs of Justice) Partner Story
IN BRIEF
The Canadian Council of Churches & The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada send letter to Minister Oda re. CIDA cuts >>
On March 20 Rev. Bruce Adema, President of the Canadian Council of Churches, & Bruce Clemenger, President of The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, sent a joint letter to Minister Bev Oda urging her to review the cut to KAIROS' funding, and requesting a meeting with her in light of the adverse affect it is having on KAIROS' global partners.
Report on Sudan leading up to polling, the first since 1986 >>
Concerns have been raised by the Sudan Council of Churches about the national elections taking place in Sudan. The SCC Secretary General Rev. Ramadan Chan Liol said, however, that the elections should continue since they are a key step in the implementation of the country's Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the 2005 accord signed in Nairobi between the government of Sudan and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement, ending 21 years of civil war.
The poll, which started on April 11th, is the first in Sudan since 1986.
Chan spoke as the elections entered their fourth day. Polling began facing complaints of delays, confusion over names and symbols, as well as the withdrawal of some candidates. Voting ended on April 15th, after a two-day extension by the National Election Commission.
World Peoples’ Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth >>
Bolivian President Evo Morales hosted the World Peoples’ Summit on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth from April 19-22nd. 90 countries and thousands of civil society and indigenous organizations affirmed their presence there giving a voice to the world's poorest so they could send an urgent climate message following the failure of the Copenhagen summit. According to Bolivia’s ambassador Pablo Solon: "The only thing that can save mankind from a [climate] tragedy is the exercise of global democracy."
To view the three-part video of Pablo Solon and Bolivia’s position on the Copenhagen climate talks and plans for the People’s Summit:
- Part-1 >>
- Part-2 >>
- Part-3 >>
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GRATITUDE AND HOPE IN TIMES OF CRISIS
Note: What follows are reflections by Mary Corkery, KAIROS’ Executive Director, speaking at a public event in Victoria, British Columbia, on March 23, 2010.
Why are we here?
We are here because you care so deeply for the well-being of our world – its people and all of Creation.
And we’re here because the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) cut all of KAIROS funding for its overseas partners and global education in Canada – $7 million over four years. That was, and is, a shock to the churches, the human rights community, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), especially those who are themselves waiting for news of their funding from CIDA and for whom this has created enormous anxiety.
What does this disaster have to do with gratitude and hope? Adversity is a moment in God’s time, so it holds both crisis and opportunity. And because this is a moment in God’s time, it is a gift.
What is KAIROS grateful for?
We are grateful for the gift of our mission, which we understand with ever greater clarity as a result of this crisis. Our mission, rooted in the gospels, is to live our faith through action for justice. The work of KAIROS – sustainability and human rights – is about love. Love, in the words of St. Paul, endures all things. For KAIROS this means love is passionate, resilient and long term.
We are grateful for the voices crying out for justice, including those of:
* women in Uganda, sitting in the hot dust – old women, women with babies, girls – learning, with the help of the women’s group (and our partner) AWEPON, how to get involved in local and regional decision-making so they can get water into their village;
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women gathered in a small room in a village near Ramallah talking about how to provide shelter for women and children fleeing the violence of the Occupation;
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Mike Karipko of Oil Watch International in Nigeria showing KAIROS staff the flaring at oil wells with the consequent pollution of water, dead fish and contaminated crops;
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the people of Fort Chipewayan on Lake Athabasca who take KAIROS church leaders to their cemetery to show how many are dying from strange diseases they never had before the tar sands development;
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Creation itself, ravaged by garbage. A KAIROS supporter tells of a retreat led by Jim Profit, a Jesuit and a passionate environmentalist. The retreat centre was beautifully arranged – a small table with a batik cloth, candles, flowers. When the retreatants came to pray the next morning, the table was covered with wet garbage. They were horrified and angry. Jim arrived and said, “I did this. This is exactly what we are doing to our earth.”
We are grateful to you, the KAIROS community of supporters, activists and friends – all of you and many hundreds more who have actively supported us through the last months:
* the religious communities who went to visit MPs as a group and increased their financial support;
* the thousands who wrote letters on our behalf to Minister of International Cooperation Bev Oda, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Jason Kenney, and Prime Minister Stephen Harper;
* those who visited well over 100 MPs to undo the mis-understandings and educate their politicians about what KAIROS really does;
* hundreds of new donors who have found us through this crisis and have turned it into an opportunity to take a stand about genuine development;
*
the retired person who decided to contribute $900 a month, explaining that he’ll try to keep up that amount because he understands that this is about advocacy and he wants to be as fully a part of it as he can manage!
Through this crisis KAIROS has grown stronger and even more convinced about the absolutely fundamental role of advocacy – bringing forward the voices of the poor who are calling for real change, an end to poverty and human rights violations, and building enduring peace.
This response is more than an emergency reaction to a crisis. People get what its about and they want to be part of what KAIROS does. I have seen Canadians react with great generosity to earthquakes, tsunamis and famine. If you had asked me six months ago whether there could ever be an outpouring of Canadian response to advocacy, I would have said no, that will not happen. But there is a constituency in this country who care about justice that I have not seen before.
And therein lies the real hope for change.
Hope does not float out there, outside of us. Hope is a decision each of us has to make, and that we need to make collectively.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the death of Archbishop Oscar Romero who, like so many of our global partners, paid with his life for demanding justice. These words were spoken at a vigil commemorating Archbishop Romero:
"That we may speak the truth in love to authority …
That authority may hear and confirm the truth wherever it is heard …
That authority in the Church may open its heart, and a space for the truth to be revealed through the laity, the poor and minorities …
That hearts may be softened for those who suffer …
That we in the church may learn to pray and to act as if they were one movement of the heart."
To this prayer, I add: that KAIROS keep faith with those to whom we have committed our work of transformation, regardless of the price we may have to pay in losing funds, or being criticized, or marginalized, or even losing our jobs.
And so it means that we carry on and will not be silenced. As part of an ecumenical justice movement, aligned with the broader social justice movement in Canada and abroad, we will help to stimulate public dialogue about what international development should mean. Then at family dinners, on soccer teams, in congregations, local pubs and on university campuses people will think about what we as Canadian citizens want to see our money being spent on for international development.
Winning will be taking up our responsibility to undo the structures of poverty and all that enables human rights abuses to persist. We will remember the words of Archbishop Romero facing down the death threats, when he said they may kill me but if they do I will rise up in the people. We will recognise the responsibility of being those people.
Then our hope is the joyful, resilient, faithful decision that we will carry on.
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