Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

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Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

<SMALL>by Dara Kam | February 17th, 2010 </SMALL>

Haiti's U.S. Ambassador Raymond Alcide Joseph and state Sen. Gary Siplin, D-Orlando



Haiti?s ambassador to the United States Raymond Alcide Joseph made an impassioned plea for help from the U.S. government at a press conference with black legislators in the Capitol today.


?We need tents. Tents to house the people because there are more than a million of them displaced. Right now they have make-shift tents with sheets and things like that. But unless we have those tents within the next six to eight weeks we?ll be in deep trouble because that?s when the rainy season starts,? Joseph said at a press conference in the office of Sen. Gary Siplin, head of the legislature?s black caucus. ?So I am asking, I cannot plead too much, please help us get as many tents as possible.?

More than 1 million Haitians have been displaced by the devastating earthquake that razed the island nation?s capital Port-au-Prince last month, leaving more than 200,000 dead and as many injured.

Read more at:

http://www.postonpolitics.com/2010/02/haiti-ambassador-to-us-send-us-your-tents-please/

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

By Adriana Brasileiro and Bill Faries

Preval Says Haiti Priority Is Shelter for 1 Million

February 17, 2010, 03:12 PM EST
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Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Haitian President Rene Preval said his government?s most urgent task is finding shelter for 1 million people displaced by the country?s Jan. 12 earthquake.

?The first priority was to save people who were trapped, people who were hurt,? Preval said today in an interview on the lawn behind the ruins of the presidential palace in Port-au- Prince. ?Now we need to help about 1 million people who are on the streets find shelter.?

Preval said the government is working with international aid organizations and the United Nations on plans for long-term housing. Providing tents to displaced people is a ?short-term? solution with the hurricane season approaching, he said, adding that procuring as many as 200,000 tents is proving difficult.

Read more at:

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-02-17/haiti-s-priority-is-shelter-for-1-million-people-preval-says.html

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

Haiti president pleads for shelter for quake's homeless </HEADLINE><!-- Class 'push-0' just right-aligns the element so that the main content comes first. -->
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<CITE>February 21, 2010 - 8:49AM </CITE>
<BOD>
Haitian President Rene Preval on Saturday pleaded for the world to urgently help provide shelter for some 1.2 million people left homeless by last month's devastating earthquake.

In comments after meeting visiting Chilean President Michelle Bachelet on the grounds of the destroyed National Palace, Preval warned that the heavy rain season, which begins around May, posed a major risk to those without shelter.

"It is urgent today that those who are in the streets, exposed to the storms ... find shelter right away," said Preval, who added that his country did not have the resources to do it alone.

He urged Bachelet to pass along the message at a summit of Latin American and Caribbean countries in Mexico next week.

"We are putting the highest priority on finding the means and the methods to allow families to be sheltered in decent conditions as rapidly as possible," said Preval.

Bachelet offered Chile's expertise in dealing with the aftermath of earthquakes, including in reconstruction.

More at:

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/haiti-president-pleads-for-shelter-for-quakes-homeless-20100221-on0c.html

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

Bill Clinton calls for better shelter for Haiti

Haitian survivors of the devastating earthquake are in urgent need of tents and sanitation, said the former US president.



Published: 12:04AM GMT 02 Mar 2010

Camp Auto-Meca, home to 15,000 refugees Photo: CLAUDIA JANKE


Bill Clinton says the needs of many Haiti earthquake survivors are not being met.

The UN special envoy for Haiti is urging UN officials to provide better shelter and sanitation for hundreds of thousands living in temporary camps at risk from floods and landslides.

As the start of the annual rainy season looms in March and the risk of floods and mudslides rises, an international relief operation is racing against time to improve shelter conditions for hundreds of thousands of quake victims who are camped out in the streets and open spaces in the capital and other towns.

Floods and mudslides killed at least 13 people in Haiti over the weekend, raising fears about the vulnerability of survivors.

"The early floods ... in Les Cayes are a sharp reminder that the very significant disaster-preparedness effort we started after the 2008 hurricanes will have to be expanded and adapted," said Iain Logan, head of operations for the Red Cross in Port-au-Prince.

The January 12 earthquake destroyed much of the capital Port-au-Prince, forcing hundreds of thousands into makeshift refugee camps.

Mr Clinton's press office says he asked for more tents, latrines and hurricane-proof dwellings during a phone conference with UN officials.
He also called for strengthening job and agricultural programmes.

The UN says 520,000 people have received emergency shelter but even more still need help.

More than a million are thought to be homeless.

Humanitarian officials previously asked aid groups to stop ordering tents in favour of plastic tarps said to be better suited for the rainy season.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/centralamericaandthecaribbean/haiti/7348959/Bill-Clinton-calls-for-better-shelter-for-Haiti.html

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

<CITE class=DL-source> Getty Images 2 days ago </CITE>
PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI - FEBRUARY 28: Residents of the Tapis Vert internally displaced persons camp navigate the mud and sewage after overnight rains soaked the tent village February 28, 2010 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

<CITE class=DL-source> Getty Images 2 days ago </CITE>
PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI - FEBRUARY 28: A young resident of the Tapis Vert internally displaced persons camp stacks rocks in an effort to build a foundation for a tent in the mud and sewage after overnight rains soaked the makeshift village Sunday February 28, 2010 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Tapis Vert, which means large green lawn in French, is normally used as a football pitch but is now home to some of Haiti's 1.2 million people left homeless by last month's 7.0 earthquake.

http://nhl.msg.com/photo/013eat0g2Xh2D?q=Haiti

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

<CITE class=vcard>2 months after Haiti quake, housing still elusive

</CITE>
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<CITE class=vcard>By BEN FOX and JONATHAN M. KATZ, Associated Press Writers Ben Fox And Jonathan M. Katz, Associated Press Writers </CITE>? <ABBR class=recenttimedate title=2010-03-12T14:30:28-0800>11 mins ago</ABBR>
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PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti ? Trash and sewage are piling up at the squalid tent camps that hundreds of thousands have called home since Haiti's devastating earthquake ? and with torrential rains expected any day, authorities are not even close to providing the shelters they promised.

Two months since the Jan. 12 quake, the government has yet to relocate a single person, despite a pledge that people would be moving into resettlement areas by early February.

Aid groups say they're ready to build but don't have the land. Government officials insist they are making progress on finding sites in closed-door negotiations with private landowners.

But time is running out for 600,000 people living under tarps, tents or simply bed sheets as the rainy season has the makings of a second major crisis. Heavy rains typically start around April 1 and there already have been deadly floods to the west of the earthquake zone.

"It really is desperate," said Alex Wynter, a spokesman in Haiti for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. "It's got the makings of a major disaster."
...

Read more:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100312/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/cb_haiti_earthquake

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!


Haitian Red Cross workers speak inside a prototype home in Port-au-Prince, Thursday, March 11, 2010. The Red Cross has initial plans to build about 50,000 homes to provide temporary shelter for displaced earthquake survivors during the upcoming rainy season.<CITE id=captionCite>(AP Photo/Andres Leighton)</CITE>


A woman walks on the edge of a sewer canal surrounding a makeshift camp for earthquake survivors in Port-au-Prince, Thursday, March 11, 2010. The 7.0-magnitude earthquake that hit Haiti on Jan. 12 left more than a million people living in makeshift camps


Rain turns the streets of a tent city into mud on March 6, in Port-au-Prince.

<!-- end photoProvider --><CITE id=photoTimestamp>Mon Mar 8, 6:51 </CITE>
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<CITE>http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Massiv...3fcc8b0c8dc99b</CITE>

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

Haiti faces new crisis as deluge follows earthquake

Rains swamp camps for survivors of January disaster as officials warn of need to move refugees to safer places


The downpours have hit refugee camps for survivors of the January earthquake. Photograph: Thony Belizaire/AFP/Getty Images


One of the heaviest rainfalls in Haiti since the country was devastated by an earthquake in January swamped refugee camps yesterday, causing panic but no reported deaths.

The overnight downpour sent water flowing down the slopes of a former golf course serving as a temporary home for 45,000 people.

There were no reports of casualties in the camp, near the country club used by the US army's 82nd Airborne division as a forward operating base.
But the deluge terrified families who survived the collapse of their homes in the earthquake on 12 January.

"I was on one side [of the tent], the children were on the other and I was trying to push the water out," Jackquine Exama, a 34-year-old mother of seven, said.

Aid workers said people were swept into torrents which ripped down tents.

"They were crying. There was fear down there. It was chaos," Jim Wilson, of the aid group Praecipio, said.

The refugees used sticks and bare hands to dig drainage ditches around their homes.
...
More at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010...urvivors-camps

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Re: Haiti ambassador to U.S.: Send us your tents! Please!

| March 25, 2010
Night crawlers

HAITI | A new disaster threatens defenseless women and children in Haitian tent cities: rape | Jamie Dean


Associated Press/Photo by Jorge Saenz

When darkness falls in the sprawling tent cities filling Port-au-Prince and surrounding areas, the camps? most vulnerable earthquake victims worry about a new disaster that threatens each night?rape by fellow tent dwellers.

Since the Jan. 12 earthquake, women and children as young as 2 years old have fallen victim to rapists seizing on the insecurity of acres of tarps and tents now home to as many as 1 million people. The insecurity is worsened for defenseless women and children living without husbands and fathers killed in the quake.

Though there?s no official toll of post-quake rapes in Haiti, aid workers and humanitarian groups estimate at least hundreds of attacks. Workers for the Haiti-based Commission of Women Victim-to-Victim (KOFAVIV) said they have tracked 230 cases of rape in 15 camps. ?The way you saw the earth shake, that?s how our bodies are shaking now,? one member of the grassroots group told Beverly Bell, an associate fellow for the Institute for Policy Studies.
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Article continues at:http://www.worldmag.com/webextra/16546