Rebecka Rosenquist
Rebecka Rosenquist joined AlertNet in 2007 after completing a Master's degree at the London School of Economics, where she focused on aid coordination and independence. Along with internships at the International Crisis Group and the U.S. State Department, she has previously worked in American politics, training and supporting women interested in running for elected office.
Responding to HIV/AIDS in an emergency
"When I was chased away from home, I thought I was going to die because I did not think that I could get anti-retrovirals (ARVs) from wherever I was going to end up." These are the words of a HIV-positive Kenyan woman who fled her country's post-election violence last year. She was speaking to The AIDS Support Organisation (TASO), a Ugandan HIV/AIDS service provider, from whom she eventually received the necessary drugs in the Mulanda refugee camp in southwest Uganda. During a humanitarian emergency, livelihoods are disrupted, families are separated and health risks increase. Risks are particularly acute for those with HIV/AIDS and for those on a treatment programme for the disease. In light of this year's World Health Day theme - the safety of health facilities and the readiness of health workers to respond in emergencies - it's worth looking at the issues around HIV/AIDS in an emergency situation. ...
Darfuri children's drawings offer evidence of war horror
The voices of the people uprooted by the violence in Sudan's Darfur region are struggling to be heard amid the storm of media coverage on the decision of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to issue an arrest warrant for Sudan's president. The conflict in Darfur has uprooted some 2.9 million people. Most are displaced inside Darfur while nearly a quarter of a million live as refugees in neighbouring Chad. Among them are countless children, many of whom have witnessed horrific brutality during their short lives. ...
Aid agencies pull out of eastern Congo
Faced with the upsurge of violence in eastern Congo, many international aid agencies are suspending operations and evacuating their staff from the volatile North Kivu region. One agency warned that children were at risk of being recruited or raped by armed groups as families fled fighting between rebels loyal to Renegade Tutsi General Laurent Nkunda's and government forces. ...
Humanitarianism on the medical frontline
In an emergency situation doctors may have to watch one patient die in order to save another. This is part of the process known as triage, an evaluation of who to treat and who to leave. A technical decision with great moral implications. This dilemma is at the heart of a documentary about Dr James Orbinski, formerly a doctor with aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) who became the organisation's president and accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on their behalf. ...
Are the radicals of 1968 the humanitarian hawks of today?
A period less like 1968 I cant imagine. That's what British playwright David Hare says about the world today, when he thinks about a British foreign policy that not only includes wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but, as he sees it, is closed for public discussion. Did the radicals of 1968 become the humanitarians of the latter part of the century? What happened to their ideals and their mistrust of state power? What are we supposed to think when we look at Bernard Kouchner, once co-founder of international relief agency Mdecins Sans Frontires and now Frances minister of foreign affairs, a man who wanted everyone to speak out against the war in Nigerias Biafra in the 60s and then backed intervention in Iraq on the grounds it would free people from Saddam Hussein? ...
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