Showing posts with label Egypt. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Egypt. Show all posts

Tuesday, January 30, 2024

Refugees in the middle east, since 1949

 Al Jazeera provides some interesting statistics and graphics in a story about UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which was founded in 1949 to provide aid to Palestinian refugees from the war that followed Israel's independence.  While Palestinians who left the middle east are of course no longer refugees (just as Jews who were refugees from Arab countries at that time are now citizens of the countries in which they settled) that's not the case for the Palestinians who fled to neighboring Arab countries, nor for their children or grandchildren. See the map below. 

Here's the Al Jazeera story:

Which countries have cut funding to UNRWA, and why?. The UN urges continued funding to UNRWA’s ‘lifesaving’ aid in Gaza, after several Western countries cut aid to the agency.  28 Jan 2024

"The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), considered a lifeline for two million people in the besieged enclave, has suffered funding cuts after several of its staff were accused by Israel of involvement in the October 7 Hamas attack."




xxxxxx

And here are all my posts on the successes and failures of refugee resettlement.

Wednesday, June 12, 2019

Kidney trafficking in Egypt with Yemeni brokers and donors (video from Al Jazeera)

Al Jazeera reports that there is an active market for kidneys in Egypt, fueled by brokers in Yemen and abetted by the Yemeni embassy in Egypt, and a famous hospital there.




HT: Erling Skancke 

Wednesday, February 27, 2019

Organ trafficking in Egypt--the Guardian

From the Guardian's series on Trafficking and exploitation :

Organ trafficking in Egypt
"Desperate to reach Europe, migrants from Africa are travelling to Egypt and selling body parts to pay for their passage"

"The trade appears to be flourishing in Egypt, bolstered by an EU-funded clampdown on refugees by security forces. There, the hostile environment created by the arbitrary detention of migrants, and the hike in smugglers’ fees, is creating a perfect opportunity for unscrupulous organ brokers who prey on those desperate to raise funds to cross the Mediterranean.

Sunday, September 17, 2017

Yemenis selling kidneys in Egypt: Al Jazeera

Al Jazeera has the (nuanced) story:
Desperate Yemenis sell organs to survive
Victims of trafficking rings say the networks operate anonymously in shisha bars and coffee shops in Yemen and Egypt.

"Ali - who is unemployed, divorced and in his early thirties - recently found himself facing a stark choice. He could either sign up to fight with the Houthi rebels on the front lines of the war in Yemen, seek work in neighbouring Saudi Arabia, or sell his organs.

"There are no jobs, and my wife left me for another man," Ali said despondently from his postoperative bed in Yemen's Bani Matar district, southwest of the capital Sanaa.

"After more than two years of war, many working-class Yemenis have turned to selling grocery items and khat - a mild, chewable narcotic - to make a meagre living. Others have opted to sell their organs to survive.
...
"Ali said that the doctor who performed his operation did not warn him of the potential consequences and there was no postoperative care. Patients are compelled to sign a contract that states, "It is not our responsibility if complications arise after the surgery," he added.

"Once the surgery was done, and I received the money, I was on my own," Ali said.
...
"A few operations are done in big hospitals with proper medical care; the majority are done in unlicensed or makeshift operation theatres with inadequate equipment or staff, Maqtari added. Only 45 percent of the healthcare facilities in Yemen are fully functional.
...
"As Yemen's war drags on, the future is anything but certain. But for Adnan Ali, who will soon enter his second marriage with the woman of his dreams and launch a taxi service, there are signs of a brighter future.

"Arrangements are under way for the wedding," he said, "and I am planning to buy a car to run a taxi."

Friday, February 10, 2017

Vatican conference on organ trafficking and transplant tourism

A recent meeting at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences of the Vatican:
Summit on Organ Trafficking and Transplant Tourism resulted in a statement and a number of news stories.  Here are several that caught my eye, with divergent views on the situation in China and how it is changing:

From the NY Times: Debate Flares Over China’s Inclusion at Vatican Organ Trafficking Meeting
"China has admitted that it extracted organs from death row prisoners for decades, in what critics have called a serious violation of the rights of inmates who cannot give genuine consent. Since Jan. 1, 2015, Chinese officials have said they no longer use prisoners’ organs, though doubts persist.

“We urge the summit to consider the plight of incarcerated prisoners in China who are treated as expendable human organ banks,” wrote the 11 signatories, who included Wendy Rogers of Macquarie University in Australia; Arthur Caplan of the New York University Langone Medical Center; David Matas and David Kilgour, both Canadian human rights lawyers; and Enver Tohti, a former surgeon from the western Chinese region of Xinjiang."
*********


From Statnews.com
China moves to stop taking organs from prisoners, WHO says
"The World Health Organization says China has taken steps to end its once-widespread practice of harvesting organs from executed prisoners but that it’s impossible to know what is happening across the entire country.

At a Vatican conference on organ trafficking this week, a former top Chinese official said the country had stopped its unethical program, but critics remain unconvinced.

In an interview Thursday, WHO’s Jose Ramon Nunez Pena said he personally visited about 20 hospitals in China last year and believes the country has reformed. But he acknowledged that it was still possible “there may still be hidden things going on.” China has more than 1 million medical centers, although only 169 are authorized to do transplants.

Nunez Pena said he had seen data including organ transplant registries and was convinced the country was now shifting away from illegally harvesting organs.

“What is clear to me is that they’re changing,” he said. “But in a country as huge as China, we can’t know everything.”
...
"Campbell Fraser, an organ trafficking researcher at Griffith University in Australia, agreed the trends over the past few years have shown a drop in the number of foreigners going to China for transplants and an increase of organ seekers heading to the Middle East.

At a press conference at the Chinese Embassy in Italy following the two-day Vatican organ conference, Fraser said migrants — including Syrians, Somalis and Eritreans — sometimes resort to selling off a kidney to pay traffickers to get them or their families to Europe.

Egypt is where the biggest problem is at the moment,” he said, adding that it has the best medical facilities in the region and can perform the live donor surgeries.

He estimated as many as 10 such illicit transplants could be happening per week, though he had no statistics and said he based his research largely on anecdotal information from recipients, law enforcement, doctors and even some organ “brokers.”

Fraser said he has access to transplant patient “chat boards” because he himself had a kidney transplant in his native Australia in 2003.

Nunez Pena said it was likely that organ trafficking would find its way to conflict-plagued regions.

“We’re hearing about a lot of problems in Egypt, Pakistan and the Philippines,” he said, predicting that authorities were poised to break up an organ smuggling ring in Egypt in the next few weeks. “Wherever you have vulnerable people, you will see these kinds of problems.”

*****************


From Science:

Study retraction reignites concern over China’s possible use of prisoner organs

A journal has decided to retract a 2016 study because of concerns that its data on the safety of liver transplantation involved organs sourced from executed prisoners in China. The action, taken despite a denial by the study’s authors that such organs were used, comes after clinical ethicist Wendy Rogers of Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, and colleagues authored a letter to the editor of Liver International on 30 January, calling for the paper’s retraction in the “absence of credible evidence of ethical sourcing of organs.”
For years, Chinese officials have come under fire for allegedly allowing the use of organs from executed prisoners for transplants, including for foreigners coming to the country for so-called medical tourism. In January 2015, it explicitly banned the practice and set up a volunteer donation system, but doubts persist that much has changed.
The disputed study—published online in October 2016—analyzed 563 consecutive liver transplantations performed before the ban (from April 2010 to October 2014) at a medical center in China. Suspicious, Rogers organized the protest letter to the journal. “Publication of data from prisoners is ethically inappropriate given that it [is] not possible to ensure that the prisoners freely agreed either to donate their organs, or to be included [in] a research program,” she tells ScienceInsider.

Sunday, January 15, 2017

Egypt arrests 'organ trafficking ring'

The BBC has the story: Egypt arrests 'organ trafficking ring'
Egyptian authorities have arrested doctors, nurses and professors suspected of being involved in an international organ trafficking ring.

(professors!)

"The arrests of at least 25 people on Tuesday also included organ buyers and middlemen, the country's Administrative Control Authority said.
Authorities also found "millions of dollars and gold bullion".
It is illegal to purchase organs in Egypt, but poverty drives some to sell their body parts.
The Administrative Control Authority, a powerful anti-corruption body, claimed the network targeted on Tuesday was "made up of Egyptians and Arabs taking advantage of some of the citizens' difficult economic conditions so that they buy their human organs and sell [them] for large sums of money".
The statement on the government website added that the group was "the largest international network for trading human organs".
...
"The arrests follow years of concern over the illegal organ trade in Egypt.
In 2010, it was named as one of the top five countries for illegal organ trade by the World Health Organization's co-ordinator at the time, Luc Noel.
Egypt passed laws to try to curb the trade, but according to the United Nations, hundreds of poor Egyptians still sell kidneys and livers each year to be able to buy food or pay off debts.
There have also been concerns over the fate of migrants who come into contact with the traffickers.
In 2012, then UN refugee agency chief, Antonio Guterres, said some migrants in Egypt's Sinai peninsula were being "killed for the traffic of organs", while earlier this year a people smuggler told Italian prosecutors that those who could not pay their debt were sold to the organ traffickers.
The allegations have not been proven, however."
*******************

Here is a related story from the Daily Mail:
45 doctors, nurses and 'middlemen' are arrested for HUMAN ORGAN trade in Egypt as migrants sell body parts to reach Europe 
The harvesting of human organs is being described as the biggest ever in Egypt
Reports those involved were targeting African migrants trying to get to Europe
As well as the arrests, health ministry recovered millions of dollars in a raid
Some arrested worked at medical faculties of Cairo and Ain Shams Universities


Saturday, September 20, 2014

Same sex marriage still widely regarded as repugnant in Egypt, and a little less so in China

Two prohibited same sex marriages, one in Egypt and one in China (in the British embassy there) draw very different reactions.

The BBC has the story from Egypt.

Arrests over Egypt 'gay wedding'

The Egyptian authorities have arrested seven men accused of appearing in a video apparently showing a gay wedding.
The video, showing a group of men celebrating on a Nile river boat, was widely shared on social media.
The men could face charges of inciting debauchery and spreading images that violate public decency.
Homosexuality is not explicitly outlawed in Egypt, but gay men are periodically accused of charges such as scorning religion or debauchery.
line
Gay rights around the world
Map showing anti-gay laws around the world
line
(The link goes to an interactive version of the above map, where you can mouse-over to see the sometimes chilling state of affairs in far flung places.)


The Telegraph has the story from China

British diplomat's gay marriage draws attention in China

Gay marriage at residence of British ambassador to Beijing goes viral on Chinese internet

"A British diplomat has become a gay icon in China after marrying his American partner on the lawn of the ambassador's residence in Beijing.
...
"Gay unions are not legal in China, where the government adopts a "three nots" approach to homosexuality: not approved, not disapproved, not promoted."

Friday, July 29, 2011

Can new science universities flourish in Saudi Arabia? In Egypt? In China?

I've written before about the difficulties of breaking into the top ranks of universities, and so it will be very interesting to watch what becomes of well funded attempts to create first rate technical institutes that will concentrate on subjects which shouldn't be religiously or politically controversial.

There's a well-funded attempt in Saudi Arabia, and also a post-revolution proposal for something similar in Egypt, although a pre-revolution attempt at a new technical university appears to be running into trouble. And finally there's China, which seems much more likely to succeed.

The Chronicle of Higher Ed reports on Saudia and Egypt:

 Saudi Arabia's $10-Billion Experiment Is Ready for Results

A Promising Egyptian Research University Gets Tangled in Post-Revolutionary Politics

Here's the Saudi story:

"King Abdullah University of Science and Technology is an anomaly many times over: a spectacular campus in the middle of nowhere; an international, co-ed institution in a gender-segregated society; and an aspiring world-class research graduate university created virtually overnight.

"Kaust, as it is known, also faces a unique challenge. It must convince the world that through a combination of wealth and vision, it can flourish in one of the most restrictive countries in the world. Many here believe that the next year will be a critical one in its development.
...
"King Abdullah, Saudi Arabia's absolute ruler, donated the university's $10-billion endowment in the hope that Kaust will make his country "a player in global science," says Kaust's president, Choon Fong Shih, who formerly headed the National University of Singapore.
...
"The university is organized around nine research centers, which focus, for example, on advanced membranes and porous materials, plant-stress genomics, and solar and photovoltaics engineering. The work of all these centers feeds into three fields key to Saudi Arabia's future: solar energy, water desalination, and drought-resistant crops.
...
"Yet while the university has been able to attract established senior academics ready for another challenge before retirement, as well as promising young faculty taking what they hope will be a career-making gamble, it remains difficult to lure tenured professors in the middle of their careers (especially since Kaust, in line with Saudi Arabia's labor laws, can offer five-year rolling contracts but not tenure).
...
"The university has also made every effort to attract a bright cohort of international students. Admission comes with free housing, insurance and a yearly round-trip ticket home; students receive $20,000 to $30,000 stipends.
...
"The institution is particularly concerned with attracting Saudi students since one of its main goals is to create a new scientific elite for the country. Saudi students make up between 15 and 20 percent of about 300 students now at Kaust. The university plans to eventually enroll 2,000 graduate and 1,000 postdoctoral students.

"The number of Saudi students with the required English and science skills is limited, and Kaust must compete for them with international universities. And it must teach some of those skills itself."
...
"Several Saudi observers expressed doubts about the university's future, saying there is no guarantee that whoever succeeds the 87-year-old King Abdullah will share his vision for it."
***********

That last line brings us right into the story about the Egyptian university:

"When Nile University opened four years ago, it offered something unusual in Egyptian higher education. In a country with weak research infrastructure, the small private nonprofit engaged students and professors in applied research in high-demand fields, such as information technology and construction engineering. Over time, it has developed global partnerships and international support.

"But today the university finds itself in the cross hairs of post-revolutionary politics. The government has repossessed its soon-to-be new campus. Uncertain about the institution's fate, many corporate and philanthropic backers have stopped their donations.

"A high-placed government official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the state was "rectifying" the improper allocation of public land and funds to a private university. Supporters say the university is a target because it was supported, and is thus now tainted, by the regime of former President Hosni Mubarak.
********


The story goes on to say that there's a new, post-revolutionary plan for a technological university in Egypt.

"Mr. Zewail, the Egyptian-American Nobel laureate, says he was contacted by Egyptian government officials shortly after the revolution and asked to revive his 10-year-old proposal for a city of science and technology that will combine a university, research centers, and a technology park. In a few months, Mr. Zewail has raised over $100-million in donations. The university that will be part of the planned city will have a different, more ambitious mission than Nile's. "It will be a national project," says Mr. Zewail, "not a private university. But I do feel very strongly we should help students and first-rate researchers" from the troubled university, he says, by absorbing as many of them as possible."
********

In China, there are also political restrictions on universities, but there shouldn't be any problem finding technically well qualified and motivated students, although there may be other cultural barriers to overcome (aside from political ones). Here's a Chronicle story on that:

News Analysis: China Looks to Western Partners to Reshape Its Universities

"Last year the University of Nottingham, which runs the oldest foreign branch campus in China, was approached by government officials from Shanghai asking if it would consider opening another location, this one 140 miles north of its undergraduate campus in Ningbo.

"The project would involve a substantial donation by a wealthy Chinese philanthropist, along with a host of government perks, including enough land to support an enrollment of 4,000. In return, Shanghai municipal officials hoped Nottingham would build a research-oriented campus in Pudong, Shanghai's major development zone. There, graduate students and professors could work on such subjects as drug development, stem-cell research, and regenerative medicine.
...
"Through speeches and policy papers, the Ministry of Education has made clear in recent years that it is unhappy with the widespread use of rote learning and narrowly defined academic programs at its universities. Last year it came out with a 10-year plan for educational reform that outlined what it viewed as the system's deficiencies.

"With China's booming and increasingly modern economy as a backdrop, the plan proposed to introduce Western-style critical thinking and interdisciplinary work into the college curriculum, and expose students to other Western concepts, such as experiential learning and professional training. The government also wants to introduce more programs taught in English."