SEC workers investigated for porn-surfing

Jim McElhatton

The work computer of one regional supervisor for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission showed more than 1,800 attempts to look up pornography in a 17-day span: "It was kind of distraction per se," he later told investigators.

But he wasn't alone. More than two dozen SEC employees and contractors over roughly the past two years have faced internal investigations after they were caught viewing pornography on their government computers, according to records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and other public documents.

The activities of porn-surfing SEC workers, a small fraction of the overall work force, have been serious enough to warrant a mention in each of the past four semiannual reports sent to Congress by the SEC's office of inspector general.

In response to the open records request by The Washington Times, the inspector general's office provided more than 150 pages of records and transcripts on the investigations, but declined to identify the employees involved. The office noted that disclosure of the employees' names "could conceivably subject them to harassment and annoyance in the conduct of their official duties and private lives."

Allan Bachman, education manager for the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, said such problems are hardly unique to the SEC. He also said the findings are troubling aside from "the egregious nature of what they're doing."

"They're simply just stealing time," he said. "They're getting paid to do something that they're not supposed to be doing."

SEC officials said the inspector general's investigations began as a result of the agency's "sophisticated surveillance and filtering system" aimed at uncovering abuse of government computer resources.

"Any level of misuse of government resources for inappropriate purposes is a matter of serious concern, which is why the SEC provides regular and comprehensive training on the proper use of the Internet," SEC spokesman John Nester said.

"Indeed, each of the cases investigated … was detected by our surveillance systems and referred to the inspector general for investigation," Mr. Nester said.

In the case of the regional supervisor, the inspector general found that during a 17-day period, he received about 1,880 "access denials," wherein the computer system blocked his attempts to view Web sites that were deemed pornographic.

The supervisor later told an IG investigator that despite the blocked attempts, he still had been looking at pornography at work up to twice a day and it had "probably occurred for a long time."

SEC records also provide insight into how some employees were able to bypass the Internet filters inside the SEC that were supposed to keep pornography off government computers.

One worker said the computer system blocked him from visiting some Web sites but that he was able to look up blogs containing pornographic images.

"I would click on it and it went to a blog and it wasn't blocked," he told investigators. "And that's how it started."

While the inspector general recommended disciplinary action up to and including dismissal, the SEC ultimately gave the employee a reprimand instead, records show.

Mr. Nester declined to discuss individual disciplinary decisions, saying supervisors examine the situations on a case-by-case basis and that sanctions generally range from counseling to dismissal.

He said disciplinary action isn't based on the number of "access denials" alone. He said denials are just one of several indicators of abuse and don't always reflect the number of times an individual seeks to view inappropriate Web sites at work.

"In fact, a single click onto one Web site that itself may not be blocked can trigger up to dozens of 'access denial' hits, one for each banner or ad on the Web page that might be blocked by our software, even if the individual has not clicked on to any of the banners or ads on that page," Mr. Nester said.

Still, fraud specialist Nicole Bocra, a former special investigator for the National Association of Securities Dealers who owns and operates a private investigative firm in Virginia, said even the most sophisticated Internet filters won't work all the time.

"People are always going to find a way around it," she said.

Aside from the obvious lost productivity, companies also have an incentive to block employees from perusing such sites because of the risk of potential computer viruses, she said.

One employee caught snooping estimated that he had been spending part of his workday looking up pornography for more than a year, though he added that he tried not to let it affect his work.

"I justified it because I would work late and I rarely would put in for any kind of comp time or anything like that," he said.

In another case, investigators found that an SEC headquarters enforcement employee had received 406 access request denials for pornographic sites from February to April last year. He was suspended for three days, records show.

Managers proposed a one-day suspension in another case involving a regional office branch chief who had received 271 access denials for pornographic sites during work hours.

Other employees resigned before being formally disciplined. One was a worker who told investigators he'd looked up pornography at work about twice a week for up to two years.

It's unclear what, if any, post-employment benefits that employee or other SEC workers caught looking up pornography at work are entitled to receive after retirement.

"We are not aware of any law that permits us in these circumstances to reduce the benefits of an employee who resigned in lieu of termination," Mr. Nester said.

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Lost children: Why they should stay in Haiti

January 31, 2010
Nicole Baute

There is no fool like the one who wants to be fooled.

Professor David Smolin wrote those words in 2005 referring to adoptive parents in the Western world. Eager to believe they are saving orphaned children from poverty, he wrote, they are easily fooled into accepting laundered children from the developing world.

He knows first-hand how such a thing could happen.

In 1998, Smolin, who teaches at Samford University's Cumberland School of Law , and his wife, Desiree, adopted two girls from India who did not take kindly to joining their large American family in Birmingham, Ala. "They had a very, very difficult time from the very moment that they arrived," Desiree Smolin says.

The sisters, roughly 10 and 12 years old, had been living in a hostel – what most North Americans would recognize as an orphanage – in the state of Andhra Pradesh, India, until their adoption. But they were not orphans.

It was not until 2004, after a series of scandals halted adoption in that part of India, that the Smolins were able to confirm the story their adopted daughters had told them six weeks after their arrival – that their parents had sent them to a hostel for an education, and they had been adopted out, without their consent.

For the last several years, the Smolins have been researching international adoption to try to figure out whether their case was a tragic fluke, akin to an airplane crash, or whether there are systemic problems within the inter-country adoption system that make it inherently vulnerable to corruption and abuse.

"The answer has unfortunately been it is systemic," Desiree Smolin says.

David Smolin argues that children have been commodified and often made into "paper orphans." In one scenario, poor parents send the children to live in a hostel or orphanage to receive food, care and education; in others, developing world recruiters use false statements or money to separate kids from their parents, or persuade them to relinquish a child to repay a debt. Sometimes extended family members or strangers simply take them. Other times lost children are taken in and little effort is made to find their families.

The children in orphanages in many countries (including potentially Haiti, UNICEF warns) are not necessarily parentless children, orphans in the Western understanding of the word.

"Our assumptions are all off," Desiree Smolin says. "We assume that every child in an orphanage is an orphan."

There are opportunities throughout the expensive adoption process for recruiters, adoption agencies, orphanages, officials and attorneys to pocket thousands of dollars – and unless we limit the amount of money Westerners can spend on foreign adoption, the financial incentive will continue to fuel corruption, David Smolin argues.

"When my wife and I first began talking about this we got very negative reactions, overwhelmingly," David Smolin says. But he says that has changed in more recent years, with well-publicized scandals in countries such as Cambodia and Guatemala and fewer foreign adoptees coming into the U.S. since 2004, when the figure peaked at 22,884.

And the media have indeed started paying attention.

In 2008, E.J. Graff published an often-cited award-winning investigative piece in Foreign Policy called "The Lie We Love," describing international adoption as a corrupt industry driven by poverty and Western demand.

And just last fall, for example, the L.A. Times reported that instead of levying fines for failing to comply with one-child policies in some rural parts of China, officials were snatching babies for adoption, turning a $3,000 per child profit in the process.

COULD THE international adoption system be inherently flawed? The idea is understandably unsettling for people in Canada, a country that saw 1,908 international adoptions in 2008 – and in the past two weeks, has ushered two planeloads of Haitian orphans into the arms of Canadian families.

In 1993, Canada became a part of the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption, which was formed to better protect children from abuse and trafficking. Although it has a lengthy adoption approval process, Haiti is not a part of the Hague Convention.

Because of stricter regulation in many countries, it became more difficult for Canadians to adopt from abroad; between 2003 and 2006 the numbers dropped. They have since been edging back up.

Karen Shadd, a spokesperson for Citizenship and Immigration, says adoption can be a lengthy process because of the need to ensure children are not being trafficked. "It's really not red tape ... the best interests of the child come first and we have to ensure that everything has been done, that the children have been legitimately placed for adoption," she says.

Even the system's skeptics and critics will say international adoption can be a good alternative for poor children in poor countries – if governments, parents and adoption agencies are vigilant.

The threat of trafficking for the purposes of adoption or prostitution becomes much graver during disasters like the current one in Haiti, which has left thousands of children orphaned or unaccompanied. Even before the earthquake, trafficking and kidnapping of children was a problem in the Western hemisphere's poorest country, and the post-quake chaos has reportedly made things worse.

In one case, a Canadian pastor told reporters that a man offered to sell him a little Haitian boy for $50. He refused.

Concern for the children's well being led Canadia and the U.S. to expedite adoptions already underway – Canada has welcomed 76 children and counting.

But it is not a time for haste. The Haitian government has since decided that the prime minister must sign off on every child that leaves the country. The U.S. government has asked its citizens for patience.

"We've heard quite a few who have suggested, `Why don't we just bring these children out (of Haiti) until things are better?'" says Patrick McCormick, an emergency communications officer with UNICEF. "Our problem with that is that it makes the whole registration, tracing process difficult to impossible, if they're kind of gone."

McCormick says UNICEF supports the decision to fast-track adoptions that were already approved, provided the paperwork is in order. But he says: "Now, post-earthquake, just because there is this disaster there's no reason to take any short cuts."

Sandra Scarth, president of the Adoption Council of Canada, agrees that the inter-country adoption system is flawed. She signed the Hague Convention as a non-governmental representative – and says, like the Smolins, that because it does not place a financial limit on adoption fees, tragedies will continue.

"I think until there is some agreement that no more than the actual cost plus a reasonable compensation for people doing the work (is allowed), I think we will continue to see people rush from one country to the next country," she says. "Then practices will be poor, they will then close that country down and start over."

KAREN DUBINSKY, a history professor at Queen's University with a 10-year-old son adopted from Guatemala, says the corruption in international adoption is a symptom of systemic poverty.

"Global poverty and political economy creates desperate people," says Dubinsky, whose book Babies Without Borders: Adoption and Migration Across the Americas, is due this spring. "One desperate person might snatch the child out of the arms of another desperate person, or one desperate mother might make her own set of decisions about needing to relinquish her child. I don't think it's adoption that creates that stuff – I think adoption responds to it, and it sometimes doesn't respond all that well."

Dubinsky says we must not assume that orphaned children in impoverished countries are isolated and alone – as if they live in cabbage patches, like the popular dolls of the '80s.

"When I see the imagery that comes through, sometimes in the media and certainly the imagery of adoption agencies, it's always children alone," Dubinsky says. "Children aren't alone. They may or may not have parents, but they have communities and they have extended family and they're not waiting for Western people to rescue them."

Dubinsky believes international adoption can indeed be done ethically. She knows her son wasn't stolen – she has met his biological mother and his foster family in Guatemala. She believes that in the "good" adoption scenario, we must respect the mother's decision to relinquish her child, whatever her reasons might be.

There is a lot of potential loss involved in international adoption, says Rachel Wegner, a board member on the international policy advocacy team of Ethica, a not-for-profit dedicated to ethical adoption. "There's a loss of culture, there's a loss of family and there's also a loss of friends and support networks the child has developed in the orphanage."

In an ideal world, Wegner says, foreign adoption would be the last resort for children – they would ideally be placed with extended family members first, and then in domestic placements to unrelated caregivers.

"Our fear in a lot of this is that those two steps are skipped."

Desiree Smolin puts it in starker terms. "I'll give you an analogy," she says. "Amputations are sometimes necessary, but you don't want every doctor that you see when you go in with your toe hurting, you don't want an amputation."

You need a doctor, she says, who is careful enough to know when the amputation is needed and when it isn't.

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Haiti detains Americans taking kids across border

By FRANK BAJAK and PAISLEY DODDS, Associated Press Writers Frank Bajak And Paisley Dodds, Associated Press Writers Sun Jan 31, 6:21 pm ET

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – Ten U.S. Baptists detained trying to take 33 children out of earthquake-shattered Haiti without government permission say they were just trying to do the right thing, applying Christian principles to save Haitian children.

But their "Orphan Rescue Mission" is striking nerves in a country that has long suffered from child trafficking and foreign interventions, and where much of the aid is delivered in ways that challenge Haiti's own rich religious traditions.

Prime Minister Max Bellerive on Sunday told The Associated Press that the group was arrested and is under judicial investigation "because it is illegal trafficking of children and we won't accept that."

The Americans are the first people to be arrested since the Jan 12 quake on such suspicions.

The government and established child welfare agencies are trying to slow Haitian adoptions amid fears that parentless or lost children are more vulnerable than ever to being seized and sold. Without proper documents and concerted efforts to track down their parents, they could be forever separated from family members able and willing to care for them. Bellerive's personal authorization is now required for the departure of any child.

The orphanage where the children were later taken said some of the kids have living parents, who were apparently told the children were going on a holiday from the post-quake misery.

The church group's own mission statement said it planned to spend only hours in the devastated capital, quickly identifying children without immediate families and busing them to a rented hotel in the Dominican Republic without bothering to get permission from the Haitian government.

Whatever their intentions, other child welfare organizations in Haiti said the plan was foolish at best.

"The instinct to swoop in and rescue children may be a natural impulse but it cannot be the solution for the tens of thousands of children left vulnerable by the Haiti earthquake," said Deb Barry, a protection expert at Save the Children, which wants a moratorium on new adoptions. "The possibility of a child being scooped up and mistakenly labeled an orphan in the chaotic aftermath of the disaster is incredibly high."

The church members, most from Idaho, said they were only trying to rescue abandoned and traumatized children.

"In this chaos the government is in right now, we were just trying to do the right thing," the group's spokeswoman, Laura Silsby, told the AP from inside Haiti's judicial police headquarters, where she and others were being held until a Monday hearing.

Officials said they lacked the proper documents for the children, whose names were written on pink tape on their shirts.

The children, ages 2 months to 12 years old, were taken to an orphanage run by Austrian-based SOS Children's Villages, where spokesman George Willeit said they arrived "very hungry, very thirsty, some dehydrated."

"One (8-year-old) girl was crying, and saying, 'I am not an orphan. I still have my parents.' And she thought she was going on a summer camp or a boarding school or something like that," Willeit said.

The orphanage was working Sunday to reunite the children with their families, joining a concerted effort by the Haitian government, the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross and other NGOs.

In Idaho, the Rev. Clint Henry denied that his Central Valley Baptist Church had anything to do with child trafficking and said he didn't believe reports that some of the children had parents.

He urged his tearful congregation to pray to God to "help them as they seek to resist the accusations of Satan and the lies that he would want them to believe and the fears that he would want to plant into their heart."

As the poorest country in the western hemisphere, Haiti is in a difficult spot — it needs aid, but deeply resents foreign meddling. Many have a mixed feelings with American evangelical Christian groups that funnel hundreds of millions of dollars into their missions in Haiti.

"There are many who come here with religious ideas that belong more in the time of the inquisition," said Max Beauvoir, head of Haiti's Voodoo Priest's Association, which represents thousands of priests and priestesses. "These types of people believe they need to save our souls and our bodies from ourselves. We need compassion, not proselytizing now, and we need aid — not just aid going to people of the Christian faith."

Many religious groups run legitimate adoption agencies and orphanages in Haiti. Some of the children in them aren't actually orphans, but have been left by relatives who can't afford their care.

Other adoption brokers offer children to rich Haitians and foreigners in return for processing fees reaching $10,000, according to the intergovernmental International Organization for Migration.

For many poor Haitians, giving up their kids for adoption is the best hope for their children's future.
"Foreigners have come here a lot asking if we would be willing to have people abroad adopt one of our kids," said Joseph Emmanuel Amazon, 53, a former concrete laborer who helped build many houses crushed in the earthquake and now struggles to support seven kids.

"I've said yes — I see all these kids running around and I can't do anything for them. They would be better off in another country. I'd like one of them to go to the United States."

His wife, Marie Rita Pierre, agreed: "I would allow one of these groups to take one of my children. My youngest daughter wants to go to university. We can't help her. I think its good groups come here to take kids, even though most of the time they will lose touch with their families."

About 20 other Haitians interviewed Sunday echoed the same desperate conclusion.

"Some parents I know have already given their children to foreigners," said Adonis Helman, 44. "I've been thinking how I will choose which one I may give — probably my youngest."

Some were less convinced.

"If their parents are dead that's one thing, but there is no way I would give my three up," said Juliet Victor, 32, a jeans seller who is surviving for now on the few pairs that weren't destroyed in the rubble.

Silsby told the AP that she hadn't been following news reports while in Haiti, and didn't think she needed Haitian permission to take them out of the country. She said they only had the best of intentions and paid no money for the children, who she said were brought to a Haitian pastor by their distant relatives.

Child trafficking "is exactly what we are trying to combat," Silsby said.

The 10 detained Americans include members of the Central Valley Baptist Church in Meridian, Idaho, and the East Side Baptist Church in Twin Falls, Idaho. They are part of the Southern Baptist Convention, which is America's largest Protestant denomination and has extensive humanitarian programs worldwide.

Another detainee is a parttime youth pastor at Bethel Baptist Church in Tokpeka, Kan.

The Idaho churches became involved with the Haitian Orphan Rescue Mission because the founders, Laura Silsby and Charisa Coulter, were members of its congregation in southwestern Idaho, Henry said.

The Idaho churches had elaborate plans before the earthquake to "provide a loving Christian homelike environment" for up to 200 Haitian and Dominican boys and girls in the Magante beach resort, complete with a school and chapel as well as villas and a seaside cafe catering to adoptive U.S. parents.

"One of the reasons that our church wanted to help is because we believe that Christ has asked us to take the gospel of Jesus Christ to the whole world, and that includes children," Henry, the senior pastor, said.

The 500-member church, where signs taped to large bins outside the pastors' offices read "Donations for Haiti," gave several thousand dollars to the mission, Henry said.

When the quake hit, they decided to move faster. Silsby, who runs an online shopping site in Idaho, quickly put their plan on Web site, soliciting tax-deductible donations while preparing their trip. "Given the urgent needs from this earthquake, God has laid upon our hearts the need to go now, versus waiting until the permanent facility is built," the group wrote.
___
Associated Press Writers Carolina Correa in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Jessie Bonner and Keith Ridler in Idaho and Rachel Zoll in New York contributed to this story.

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UK: My Minx adopt an "orphan accessory" game - poking fun or just offensive?

Dear Friends:

I know I shouldn't be surprised, but honestly I am. Even after all these years of anti-trafficking/anti-exploitation advocacy I am sometimes surprised that fellow human beings are so lacking in decency, in common sense, and yes, even morality, that they invent things like this revolting game targeting young girls while intentionally embedding hypersexuality and racist stereotypes; and then have the audacity to call it all fun and harmless!

Just in case you are drawn into Chris Evans' "we're just letting kids make choices" hogwash, remember that pre-teen girls' minds are not fully developed. They do not have the cognitive capacity to analyze all that's going on in "the game." It is wrong to send such strong messages to children and then expect them to realize it's supposedly "satire."

Abolition!
Lisa
http://www.my-minx.com/
http://jezebel.com/5457525/my-minx-enraging-parents-lampooning-celebrity-culture http://tildabattersby.livejournal.com/12005.html

My Minx adopt an "orphan accessory" game - poking fun or just offensive? Posted by [info]tildabattersby *
Tuesday, 26 January 2010 at 04:50 pm

A new online game aimed at pre-teen girls encourages players to buy orphans as “virtual fashion accessories”, administer contraceptives, and select from a range of character statuses including “preggers”, “horny” and “looking for rumpy pumpy”.

The My Minx game, developed by British firm Blighty Arts, requires players to choose highly sexualised features for their “minx” alter egos (including breast and waist size) and clothe them in revealing outfits and lingerie.

Once a “minx” has been created players can choose their “orphan accessories” from a virtual orphanage populated by children based on so-called “celebrity orphans” including Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s children Pax, Maddox and Zahara.

The orphans’ characteristics are racially stereotyped: Cambodian Maddox is said to be fan of eating cockroaches while Ethiopian Zahara’s favourite food is “guinea pig”; and Monglian Jamiyan, modelled on Ewan McGregor’s daughter, apparently enjoys eating rats.

Players can go binge drinking, clubbing, pull men and then decide whether or not to take the morning after pill – and with players as young as seven-years old it is understandable that parent groups including Parentkind have expressed disapproval.

Blighty Arts claims on its website to “create artistic well researched and engaging on-line entertainment [with] a guiding set of principles that drive our business and influence our actions.”

The company’s director Chris Evans told The Telegraph: "It is nonsense to suggest our game is a bad influence on young …We should let them grow up making their own decisions about the games they play. The game teaches children about the world while poking fun at celebrity adoptions.”

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Haiti: USG Public Statement -- Operation Protect Children

OPERATION PROTECT CHILDREN
A Whole of Government Response to Haiti’s Most Vulnerable Children
January 27, 2010
Public Statement

The United States Government is deeply concerned about the welfare of children affected by the earthquake in Haiti and has pulled together its best and most experienced child protection and care personnel from Washington and the field. Under the leadership of the US Government Special Advisor for Orphans and Vulnerable Children, this team is developing and initiating Operation Protect Children to shape and guide US Government action and to ensure that our efforts are coordinated with that of the international community and that they are implemented in close consultation with the Haitian Government. This team is working on both immediate response issues as well as planning for the coming weeks, months, and years.

The US Government is committed to ensuring that every child who survived the devastating earthquake in Haiti is safe and protected. There are several groups of children who, due to their increased vulnerability, are receiving particular attention. These include children who have been separated from their families during the earthquake and children who were living in orphanages prior to the earthquake.

Many orphanages are caring for large numbers of children. However, it is important to note that most children living in these orphanages were placed there as a result of poverty, not necessarily because they are without a family. Until the status of parents and close relatives of children in orphanages can be determined, the US Government is assuming that family members or relatives are alive.

International and local partners, together with the Haitian Government, have come together to form the Child Protection Sub-cluster in Haiti, led by UNICEF. The US Government is linked into this coordination mechanism, which is working actively to ensure that all available resources and capacities are used rapidly and effectively to improve the safety and well-being of the most vulnerable children. The Sub-cluster is carrying out a rapid assessment of orphanages in the earthquake affected zone, with the aim of addressing security and subsistence needs. Safe Spaces have been established to provide nutritional and psychosocial support and activities for displaced children living in camps. In addition, interim care centers have been established to provide 24-hour care for children who have been separated from their families and are unaccompanied by an adult caregiver. As of January 26, UNICEF reports that at least 40,000 children had been reached through these activities. Twenty child Protection Brigades with the Haitian National Police have also been deployed to the airport and borders in an effort to prevent child trafficking.

In addition, the US Government’s Response Management Team in Washington is receiving and channeling requests for help to orphanages and directing this information to responders in Haiti. The priority in responding to children affected by the disaster in Haiti is to assist them in the location where they have been living, if possible, and if not, in another part of the country that is as close by as possible. After securing their safety and immediate welfare, efforts will be made to trace family members and assess whether, with assistance, they would be able to provide an adequate level of care. Experience in many other emergencies has shown that rapidly evacuating children to another country, though done with very good intentions, can separate families and is not the best way to ensure children’s safety and longer term well-being. It is the United States’ view that a child’s safety and well-being depend primarily on the protection and care their families are able to provide. In line with this principle, the US Government has made strengthening the capacity of families in Haiti to care for their children one of its highest priorities.

The Child Protection Sub-cluster has initiated a family tracing and reunification program with the aim of reuniting children with immediate or extended family members. It is in the process of setting up a 24 hour help line to facilitate the identification of separated children and tracing of their families. The International Committee of the Red Cross is also providing tracing services in Haiti, in partnership with the Haitian Red Cross. Until every effort has been made to reunite children with their families, adoption cannot be considered. However, the United States is expediting processing for orphans who were in the process of being adopted by American families before January 12, in order to unite them with their adoptive families in a manner that ensures proper safeguards.

What is the US Government doing to protect Haiti’s most vulnerable children?

The US Government has established Operation Protect Children to respond to the emergency and long-term needs of Haiti’s most vulnerable children, including those who are living in orphanages, unaccompanied and separated from their families.

Operation Protect Children is being led by the US Government’s Special Advisor on Orphans and Vulnerable Children, Gary Newton. Mr. Newton has been in Haiti since January 25th.

Operation Protect Children is supported by the US Government’s Response Management Team and the Interagency Working Group on Orphans and Vulnerable Children in Haiti in Washington, DC.

Operation Protect Children is working hand-in-hand with the Child Protection Sub-cluster in Haiti. The Sub-cluster is led by UNICEF and includes partners from 29 international organizations and non-governmental organizations. Many of these organizations, including UNICEF, are receiving funding from the US Government.

To date, the US Government has channeled $14 million through USAID’s Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance to support the immediate needs of Haiti’s most vulnerable children and families, including emergency relief assistance, identification of separated and unaccompanied children, family tracing and the establishment of child-friendly spaces. US Government assistance to Haiti following the earthquake has totaled $379 million to date.

The Child Protection Sub-cluster is assessing children’s needs at orphanages, camps for internally displaced persons, crèches and hospitals in Port-au-Prince other earthquake-affected areas. Availability of food and services is uneven and the Child Protection Sub-cluster is working with international partners, including the World Food Program, to ensure immediate responses.

The Child Protection Sub-group is establishing a 24-hour public hotline to facilitate the identification of unaccompanied and separated children and family tracing.

UNICEF, in cooperation with the Government of Haiti, is establishing sites for emergency interim care for unaccompanied children. These sites will accommodate 900 children.

Child friendly spaces for 200,000 children are being established with US Government support.

Twenty child Protection Brigades with the Haitian National Police have also been deployed to the airport and borders in an effort to prevent child trafficking. Identification verification bracelets are being issued for separated and unaccompanied minors.

Needs are greater than current capacity to respond. The US Government is working with UNICEF and other actors to ensure that needs are met efficiently and effectively.

The US Government is developing an operational plan to meet the needs of Haiti’s most vulnerable children. The operational plan is being developed on the basis of internationally recognized principles, including the Interagency Guiding Principles on Unaccompanied and Separated Children.

For more information on the US Government’s response to Haiti’s most vulnerable children, please contact HaitianChildrenUSAID@usaid.gov or (202) 712-0550.

For information pertaining to pending adoptions, please contact AskCI@state.gov.

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UK: Green and Black's to go 100% Fairtrade

Dear Friends:

Here is news from the UK of important progress in the fight for Fairtrade chocolate. Let's hope for similar developments in the U.S. and the rest of the developed world.

Please note: "The average American eats almost 12 pounds of chocolate a year, supporting an industry that saw retail sales of more than $16 billion in 2006. If you’re among the 46 percent of Americans who say they can’t live without chocolate, you can avoid the well-documented problem of child slave labor in the cocoa industry, and direct your share of that $16 billion toward chocolate that helps communities and the environment. Look for candy bars, baking cocoa, hot chocolate mix, chocolate chips, chocolate coins, and miniatures."
(excerpt from: http://www.greenamericatoday.org/PDF/GuideFairTrade.pdf)

Abolition!

Lisa

Green and Black's to go 100% Fairtrade
Move will make Green & Black's the world's leading manufacturer of organic Fairtrade chocolate

Organic chocolate maker Green & Black's today pledged to switch its entire worldwide food and beverage range to Fairtrade by the end of next year, in a groundbreaking move that will make it the world's leading manufacturer of organic Fairtrade chocolate.

The company's Maya Gold chocolate was the first official Fairtrade product to go on sale in Britain 15 years ago. Its extended range of chocolate bar and beverage products in the UK will start to carry the distinctive blue and green Fairtrade logo from late 2010, and it is hoped that full conversion of the entire chocolate bar and beverage range in more than 30 countries will be achieved by the end of 2011.

The move to Fairtrade certification will build on the original Fairtrade relationship with cocoa farmers in Belize through guaranteed funding. It will also significantly increase Fairtrade sales in the UK. Green & Black's annual retail sales are approximately £65m.

The Fairtrade market, which now covers products from developing countries ranging from chocolate and coffee to cotton, was worth £22m in 1999, according to a recent survey from the Co-op. Last year, sales of Fairtrade products grew to £635m and the Co-operative is predicting it could break the £1bn barrier in 2010.

The company, founded by the organic pioneer Craig Sams, was controversially sold in 2005 to confectionery giant Cadbury for a reported £20m. Providing a shareholder revolt does not stop Kraft's takeover of Cadbury this month, it will become wholly owned by the US company in February.

The Fairtrade funding, approximately £300,000 a year, received by farmers in the Dominican Republic will be spent on sustainability initiatives which will include improving quality, yields and education, which in turn will increase income for farmers, ensure the cocoa industry becomes more sustainable and secure the supply of high-quality organic cocoa beans to support the brand's international growth.

Dominic Lowe, managing director of Green & Black's, said: "We buy quality, organic Trinitario cocoa beans from co-operatives in the Dominican Republic, and have done so for 10 years. Up until now we have committed US $500,000 in local initiatives to improve quality and availability, but we wanted to do more to support farmers."

The Fairtrade Foundation (UK) executive director, Harriet Lamb, commented: "This newest commitment to Fairtrade will enable producers to benefit themselves, scale up their businesses and invest in their communities, not just now but for the future."

The move represents another major coup for Fairtrade, which last year certified Cadbury's Dairy Milk, and means chocolate is now a mainstream Fairtrade product alongside bananas, tea and coffee.

It was also announced in December that the UK's best-selling chocolate biscuit bar, Kit Kat, is to receive ethical certification through the Fairtrade quality mark, from this month.

The Co-operative switched all their own label block chocolate to Fairtrade in 2002, resulting in a 50% sales volume uplift in the 12 months following the move. The Co-operative's milk chocolate bar was the UK's first own-brand Fairtrade product launched in 2005.

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Florida: Outreach Event in Miami during Super Bowl 44

Dear Friends:

Here is a FORWARDED MESSAGE from the FLORIDA COALITION AGAINST HUMAN TRAFFICKING. Some great ideas here. There's no reason why these types of efforts cannot be replicated elsewhere.

Abolition!

Lisa

Dear Colleagues,

The Florida Coalition Against Human Trafficking, KLaasKids Foundation. Global Child Rescue, Stand Up for Kids, Kristi House, Free International and Florida Abolitionists have join efforts to conduct street outreach to hotels and business owners that may come in contact with victims of commercial sexual exploitation and to conduct outreach to minors located in areas known for commercial sexual exploitation during the week of the Super Bowl 44 in Miami, Florida. Last year we provided 13 leads and one of the leads turned out to be the " Treasure Island " case in St. Pete, Florida. Six pimps were arrested and 4 domestic victims were rescued.

Our goal:

To identify and assist in the rescue and recovery of juveniles or adult victims of sex trafficking.

Our objectives:

Increase overall awareness of domestic minor sex trafficking to Miami/Ft. Lauderdale area businesses.

Increase overall awareness and identification techniques for volunteers

Create and informed presence to the reality of domestic minor sex trafficking to visitors and residents of Miami/Ft.Lauderdale through media outlets and street presence.

Increase the opportunity to identify and rescue potential victims of domestic minor sex trafficking and adult victims of human trafficking. We will also be on The lookout for International victims of human trafficking.

Develop a spirit of teamwork and alliance building between the partner groups, law enforcement and the community.

Our outreach event starts with the arrival of Outreach Team members on February 2nd and 3rd

February 3rd at 7pm: Introduction & Street Outreach Training
February 3rd from 10:00 pm to 2:00 am Street Outreach with trained volunteers and staff members of representative organizations.
February 4th from 9:00pm to 2:00 am Street Outreach ( only experienced outreach teams)
February 4th from 11:00pm to 3:00 am Juvenile Sweep with LEO
February 5th from 9:00am to 12:00 pm Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking Training
February 5th from 1:00pm Team briefing and assignments
February 5th from 2:oopm to 5:00 pm Business/ Street Outreach (over 100 volunteers)
from 5:00pm to 6:00 pm Team debriefings
February 6th 12:00pm Team briefing and assignments
February 6th from 1:00pm to 4:00 pm Business Street Outreach (over 100 volunteers)
February 6th 8:00pm: Team briefing and assignments
February 6th from 9:00pm to 2:00 am: Business Street Outreach (only experienced outreach teams)

For almost a week Outreach volunteers, FCAHT, KlaasKids, Free International, Stand Up for Kids will be camping at the gymnasium of a church in Miami. The church is even hosting a Superbowl party for all volunteers. They are allowing us to sleep, shower and use their facilities as a staging area. Business around the area will be donating food for all the volunteers.

All team members and volunteers will be provided with "outreach shirts" for identification purposes during the business sweeps.

All team members and volunteers will;; have outreach material to hand-out to business owners.
Teams will have copies of missing child flyers of " local" children to pass out to business owners.

MSNBC will be with us through out the week. Last year they were filming with us the Tampa Superbowl Outreach event for a special documentary they are working on domestic minor sex trafficking.

We wanted to share with all of you what we have been coordinating for the last 6 months.

I would like to thanks all the organizations that have partner with FCAHT and KlaasKids for Superbowl 44 in Miami Springs Florida.

Anna Rodriguez

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