Visiting Clear Path Partners in Hue, Vietnam

CPI Executive Director Kiman Lucas and Vietnam staff visited with members of the Hue Friendship Union

It's always good to be in Vietnam, and with our staff in Dong Ha, where Clear Path International began in 2000, first clearing land of unexploded ordnance and then assisting the victims of encounters with them, as well as their families and communities.

Today we met in the beautiful city of Hue, the home of the last Vietnamese emperor, with members of the Hue Friendship Union, our partner organization in providing Accident Survivor Assistance Programs or ASAP.

I was hosted by Mr. Anh, director of the Hue Friendship Union and former mayor of Hue. Clear Path International has assisted 945 explosive ordinance survivors in the three years in which we have operated ASAP in central Vietnam's Hue Province. We plan to complete our projects here in the next year.

Karen Woman Counters Violence with Care and Compassion

Cresa at far right with children at Mrs. Nana's Farm

By Cresa Pugh, CPI Southeast Asia Resident Manager

Recently, I traveled with Mr. Murakami of the Karen Department of Health and Welfare (KDHW), south of Mae Sot, Thailand, to a small, rural village just outside of Umphang along the Thai-Burma border. This is the location of the home and farmland of Mrs. Nana, a woman from Karen State in Burma who has long been critical to the Karen struggle for freedom, independence and basic human rights. Mrs. Nana is originally from a Karen village just across the border within short walking distance from her current location, but the situation between the two areas could not be more disparate.

History
Several years ago Mrs. Nana operated a clinic in the Karen village that provided basic healthcare to the entire surrounding community. Perceived as a threat to the stability of their regime, and seeking to undermine the capacity of local leaders, the SPDC, Burma's military regime, burned her clinic to the ground. Since then, the government has allowed her to rebuild her operation, but only after she agreed to certain concessions, including a realignment of her political alliances. In the meantime, the government continued to plant landmines in the surrounding areas and insurgents, in defense, did as well.

The result is a dangerous, unstable warzone where parents are afraid to let their children leave their homes, thus disabling them from receiving a proper education and access to other community based necessities. Additionally, countless members of the community have suffered landmine casualties and are now unable to not only receive adequate medical treatment and support, but unable to work in such a way that they are able to support themselves and their families.

During his visits to the region conducting mine risk education workshops, Mr. Murakami identified the need for these survivors to have opportunities to break their cycle of poverty, to stop borrowing money from local lenders at interest rates of up to 100 percent, and to begin making their way toward economic stability and self-sufficiency.

The Project
Mrs. Nana identified 10 landmine survivors and amputees who would participate in a farming initiative that would provide them with comprehensive training in construction, animal husbandry and harvesting, and ultimately provide them with opportunities to launch their own income-generating projects. Specifically, the group, under the instruction of Mr. Murakami, will build and operate a fish pond, raise pigs and chickens, and grow mushrooms.

The project will provide food for the local community as well as the opportunity to sell the products in local markets and make additional money that will provide revenue for the farmers and ultimately can be reinvested into the project to purchase more capital. There is also a well on the farm that will be enhanced to provide access to clean water for some in the surrounding village.

Currently Mrs. Nana has 36 children, a number which fluctuates daily - ages 4 to 14 - living in her home whose parents feel the situation in Karen state is too unstable for them to endure. The children are all receiving a formal education at a local migrant school in her Thai village, but sadly, Thai authorities are planning to close most of the migrant schools along the border. Mrs. Nana plans to open her own migrant school on her farm in the coming months; 29 more children from the Karen village will join her once that happens.

Reflection
With the imminent repatriation of hundreds of thousands of migrants from Burma - mainly Karen - at the hand of the Thai government, the situation along this area of the border is unlikely to change anytime soon. It's easy to feel helpless, hopeless, angry, frustrated, defrauded, sad and the whole host of emotions that accompany senseless conflict, but all is not lost. As long as there are militaries and counterinsurgents and generals and juntas, there will also always be people like Mrs. Nana and countless other individuals who counter the terror and violence, the landmines and rape, with healthcare, education, food, shelter, and love.

I am humbled by the privilege to engage in her efforts, and by the opportunity to work with an organization, Clear Path International, that recognizes the importance of this struggle. CPI provides support for the farming initiative itself, Mr. Murakami's mine risk education train-the-trainer and direct training workshops, and to cover the logistics of Mrs. Nana transporting victims from Karen state to a Thai hospital when a landmine accident occurs.

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Young Cluster Munition Survivor Needs Your Help

Ves Chiveng on his release from the hospital, walking for the first time in six years.

When filmmaker Cathy MacDonald met 15-year-old Ves Chiveng in Phnom Penh, he was in severe pain from a leg swollen and infected with shrapnel that doctors had missed while treating him for cluster munitions injuries six years earlier.

MacDonald, who was in Cambodia making a documentary on cluster munitions clearance, recalls that Chiveng "was in a very bad way" when she first spoke with him.

After his injury near his home in Sre Traeng Village, Cambodian Red Cross took him to Kratie Provincial Hospital for emergency care. But doctors there failed to remove all the shrapnel from the blast. Chiveng's family is Pnong, an ethnic minority, and could not afford the medicines or plasma required for his treatment at state-run hospitals. Although Chiveng and his 20-year-old sister, Phua, live with their uncle and his family of seven Phua is her brother's sole provider. She works in her village a few months a year planting rice and vegetables for about $3 a day.

While Chiveng apparently was eligible for free medical care, his family was not informed of this; nor did they know how to access the treatment required from their small village. As a result, Chiveng was unable to walk or attend school, or receive any effective pain relief for many years following the accident

In February, MacDonald and some of her colleagues at the nonprofit organization, Handicap International, gave Chiveng and his sister money to pay for necessities while he underwent extensive surgical procedures at Kantha Bopha Hospital in Phnom Penh. Chiveng was in the hospital more than two months. Shrapnel also was removed from his right leg and stomach and he was treated for a heart condition. He is now able to walk for the first time since the accident.

Doctors at the Calmette free hospital in Phnom Penh pooled money to pay for Chiveng and his sister to return by taxi to their home. And Cambodian Mine Action Group also raised money to help them.

While Chiveng was in the hospital, MacDonald and Nick Boedicker, program manager of Handicap International, contacted Clear Path International to inquire about the possibility of providing ongoing assistance for Chiveng and his sister Phua during his recovery. HI's victim assistance program in Cambodia focuses on prosthetics and rehabilitation which does not extend to cases such as Chiveng's. Clear Path's work in the country is centered on socio-economic and agricultural support in mine-saturated Battambang Province. Essentially, Chiveng fell through the cracks.

Nevertheless, Samea Vin from Clear Path's partner organization Cambodian Volunteers for Community Development (CVCD) visited Chiveng in the hospital to see how they might help. CVCD helped Phua purchase school clothes and supplies with money from Boedicker, MacDonald and friends while all concerned continued to look for a longer-term solution to the family's troubles.

Chiveng will need ongoing care and transportation for any future checkups or treatment. Phua would like to continue her education, which costs about $10 per month and to train as a hairdresser or seamstress. A bicycle has been bought for Phua to take Chiveng to school, where he will begin again at the second-grade level.

Despite the best efforts of humanitarian organizations, there will always be those who fall through the cracks. Thanks to some caring individuals, Chiveng now has a chance for a much brighter future. Clear Path International wants to make sure that he continues to receive help and that other young Cambodians who find themselves in similar straits also get the assistance they need. If you would like to help Chiveng and others like him, please click here.