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December 2004 Update
Advent Prayers
Since this is the first week of Advent, this is just to remind you that the UI advent prayers on the theme of trafficking are on the web at the following addresses:
English
Spanish
French
Participation in NGO Committees at the UN
Ana Martinez de Luco, CCV, is actively representing UNANIMA International in the
Working Group on Girls. One of their activities is ensuring that young
girls ( 13 to 18 years old) will be participating in the Beijing +10 review at the
Commission on the Status of Women 28 February -11 March 2005. The group is inviting
at least three girls to present their concerns before the government representatives at
that meeting. As of now they have been able to have someone almost all the continents
each to represent a different reality: from Bangkok, Thailand, a girl will speak on AIDS,
from Poland, about opportunity for youth employment, from the Philippines, about the hard
lives of street children or children suffering from extreme poverty; from USA, about the
lack of international education and sense of solidarity . The connection with the girl
from the Philippines is through Ana's years of working there and UI is helping by
sponsoring her.
Ana has also begun to represent UI at the meeting of the NGO working group preparing for the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Peoples in May 2005.
Catherine continues to represent us at the NGO Committee on Social Development,
NGO Committee on Poverty Eradication, NGO Committee on Commission for the Status of
Women which includes a subcommittee specifically working against trafficking, chair
the NGO committee on HIV/AIDS. In preparing for the
Commission on Social Development,
the HIV/AIDS committee with Catherine's leadership prepared a written statement with
policy recommendations on the situation of HIV/AIDS orphans (also attached to this e-mail).
For the Commission on the Status of Women, the committees will be responsible for two side
events related to trafficking and for putting together a reception honoring the new special
rapporteur on trafficking appointed by the Secretary General in late October. It is also hoped that the committee will have an anti-trafficking poster and bookmark to present to people at the CSW to raise awareness of the issue.
Colombia
Catherine will be traveling to Europe 14-21 December to work with Pax Christi International to complete the written report following the advocacy visit in July.
Meeting with General Leadership Teams
While in Rome, Catherine will meet with the leadership teams of UI congregations: CCV, SHCJ, and RJM.
Meeting with SUSC Congregational Justice Committee
Catherine will be giving a day long session with the SUSC congregational justice committee on 8 December in Convent Station New Jersey. The committee consists of 6 Justice and Peace link persons from Cameroon, Franco-Belgian Province, Haiti, Argentina, Anglo-Hibernian Province along with Ines Maria Gutierrez from their General Council and Mary Lou Simcoe as UNANIMA International board member.
Donation Received
UNANIMA International received a donation of $1000 from the Hollione Foundation - a small
family foundation in Oregon who has heard about our work against trafficking. We thank
foundation member Jeannine Murrell for this donation.
UN Applications
Catherine has received word that UNANIMA International's application for DPI
affiliation will be considered in December. However, the review of UI's ECOSOC
application will take place in June 2005 as the original letter from the UN department
that handles these applications had indicated.
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