“Libya is a reminder that sometimes it is possible to use military tools to advance humanitarian causes.”
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Democracy Under Way, Tunisia Turns To Tough Economic Agenda - Gulf Business - 0 views
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With a new economic agenda being created and putting into place the people of Tunisia are worried. With the term "reforms" people of Tunisia are worried that the wrong issues are going to be handled. Like for instance creating jobs instead of increasing prices. Authorities tried to raise money by imposing a tax of $20 on foreign travellers, that angered residents but also hurt trade with Libya. This caused protests, caused officers to react with physical abuse.
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Must-Watch: Ex Marine Goes Crazy, Blows Whistle On Syrian False Flag And Real Agenda An... - 0 views
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shared by allieggg on 23 Nov 14
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What Happened to the Humanitarians Who Wanted to Save Libyans With Bombs and Drones? - ... - 0 views
firstlook.org/...nted-save-libyans-bombs-drones
humanitarian libya civil war politics US Intervention NATO revolution
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intervention was a matter of upholding “universal values,” which itself advanced America’s strategic goals. In justifying the war to Americans (more than a week after it started), President Obama decreed: “Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different.”
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But “turning a blind eye” to the ongoing – and now far worse – atrocities in Libya is exactly what the U.S., its war allies, and most of the humanitarian war advocates are now doing.
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“this was a rare military intervention for humanitarian reasons, and it has succeeded” and that “on rare occasions military force can advance human rights. Libya has so far been a model of such an intervention.”
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What’s most notable here isn’t how everything in Libya has gone so terribly and tragically wrong. That was painfully predictable: anyone paying even casual attention now knows that killing the Bad Dictator of the Moment (usually one the U.S. spent years supporting) achieves nothing good for the people of that country unless it’s backed by years of sustained support for rebuilding its civil institutions.
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As the country spun into chaos, violence, militia rule and anarchy as a direct result of the NATO intervention, they exhibited no interest whatsoever in doing anything to arrest or reverse that collapse. What happened to their deeply felt humanitarianism? Where did it go?
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But the most compelling reason to oppose such wars is that – even if it all could work perfectly in an ideal world and as tempting as it is to believe – humanitarianism is not what motivates the U.S. or most other governments to deploy its military in other nations.
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If there were any authenticity to the claimed humanitarianism, wouldn’t there be movements to spend large amounts of money not just to bomb Libya but also to stabilize and rebuild it? Wouldn’t there be just as much horror over the plight of Libyans now: when the needed solution is large-scale economic aid and assistance programs rather than drone deployments, blowing up buildings, and playful, sociopathic chuckling over how we came, conquered, and made The Villain die?
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The way most war advocates instantly forgot Libya existed once that fun part was over is the strongest argument imaginable about what really motivates these actions. In the victory parade he threw for himself, Kristof said the question of “humanitarian intervention” will “arise again” and “the next time it does, let’s remember a lesson of Libya.”
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This article basically lays out the faults in US intervention in Libya during the fall of Gaddafi and condemns the US officials for their lack of hindsight in their agenda. The US claimed that they could not "turn a blind eye" to atrocities and human right violations in other countries and to intervene in Libya was a matter of upholding "universal values." After the successful ousting of Gaddafi, the US hypocritically turned their back on the country as a whole, leaving them to pick up the pieces and re-build themselves in the midst of socio-political and economic chaos. The US claims that military intervention is sometimes necessary to address human right violations, but in the case of Libya more violations have occurred as a result of a fallen regime rather than because of its reign. The author basically says that the US should have predicted that short-term intervention strategies achieves nothing without years of sustained support for rebuilding the civil institutions.
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shared by fcastro2 on 02 Mar 15
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Syrian crisis: India, China and Russia call for peace negotiations | Business Standard ... - 0 views
www.business-standard.com/...gotiations-115020201360_1.html
india china russia peace ISIS syria politics war
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India, China and Russia on Monday reiterated that there is no military solution to the Syrian crisis and urged all parties to abjure violence and resume peace negotiations
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The Foreign Ministers of the three sides called on the Syrian Government and opposition factions to resume the Geneva process as soon as possible, stick to the approach of political settlement and draw on the useful experience of others to find a "middle way" that conforms to Syria's national conditions and accommodates the interests of all parties, and start the national reconciliation process at an early date.
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They highly valued the efforts by Russia to convene the first meeting of inter-Syrian consultations between representatives of the Syrian Government and opposition groups in January 2015
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The Foreign Ministers expressed deep concern over the ongoing turmoil in Iraq and its spill over effects, and emphasized their respect for the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Iraq, and their support for the efforts of the Iraqi government to uphold domestic stability and combat terroris
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all parties in Iraq enhance unity and reconciliation so as to swiftly restore national stability and social order.
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They called on all parties to support the Iraqi government and people in their efforts to build a stable, inclusive and united Iraq taking into account the interests of all segments of the Iraqi society
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The Ministers urged the international community to provide continued assistance and humanitarian support for Iraqi refugees and internally displaced people
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shared by nicolet1189 on 07 Nov 14
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Social Media Prove Double-Edged Sword for ISIS - 1 views
dailysignal.com/...-prove-double-edged-sword-isis
metadata ISIS media privacy intelligence surveillance
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individual identities and landscape and urban geography in photos to encoded data from email accounts, servers and location of signals.
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Also, by destroying the telecommunications infrastructure, the U.S.-led air campaign has forced ISIS in Syria to rely on non-secure routers that boost signals, making communications easy to intercept for intelligence agencies.
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Although ISIS has been able to successfully use social media platforms to cater to their agenda, they have recently changed their strategies to deter US intelligence from intercepting crucial information. They have issued a new instruction manual to members regarding online behavior in order to circumvent data collection from digital postings.
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shared by ccfuentez on 03 Feb 16
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Human Trafficking and the Human Rights Agenda Against Eritrea | Red Sea Fisher - 0 views
redseafisher.wordpress.com/...-rights-agenda-against-eritrea
Eritrea human-trafficking Anti-Regime Educational Opportunity
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“Ruthless Kidnapping Rings Reach From Desert Sands to U.S. Cities.” The article chronicles the touching personal accounts of Eritrean refugees being kidnapped and taken for ransom in Egypt’s Sinai desert.
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In 2013, human trafficking in Eritrea was gaining a lot of international attention, especially from the piece, "Ruthless Kidnapping Rings Reach From Desert Sands to US Cities." In 2009, a possible solution was made to send large numbers of youths to the United States in order for them to receive an opportunity to get a better education.
Cologne sex assaults: Muslim rape myths fit a neo-Nazi agenda | Voices | The Independent - 0 views
www.independent.co.uk/...-neo-nazi-agenda-a6872566.html
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Egypt: Women's Groups Put Forward 5 Draft Laws for New Parliament's Agenda - allAfrica.com - 0 views
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shared by ralph0 on 17 Feb 16
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If the Syria ceasefire fails, Isis will be the least of the west's problems | Michael C... - 0 views
www.theguardian.com/...an-saudi-arabia-vengeful-assad
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An Egyptian Feminist on Twitter - 1 views
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Twitter CEO: ISIS Threatened to Assassinate Me for Deleting Jihadist Accounts - 0 views
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social media giant's platform has played a central role in ISIS's attempts to spread their terrorist propaganda across the globe.
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treading a fine line between upholding the Constitution's freedom of speech premise, while employing Twitter's own terms of service and security tactics in what has become a global effort (both through munitions as well as over the Internet) to thwart the onslaught of terror being wrought by ISIS.
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Twitter prohibits the use of their platform to promote evil and agendas that threaten to harm the safety and security of citizens both domestically as well as internationally.
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Threats from ISIS extend to twitter as it threatened to assassinate the CEO Dick Costolo for deactivating ISIS held accounts. ISIS has also called upon citizens within the countries of twitter's operating facilities to attack Twitter employees on, currently Twitter has offices in the US, Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Canada.
The 'Randomness' of Islamophobia at US Airports | Turkey Agenda - 0 views
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shared by sheldonmer on 16 Nov 14
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Hard Evidence: how does false information spread online? - 0 views
theconversation.com/nformation-spread-online-25567
social media false information online news procon
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This article is a great way to look at the negative effects of social media and the false information it can spread. After the Egyptian Revolution, many false reports were being spread through social media to create distrust between groups of people who were unhappy with the result of the uprising. The struggle for power is real in Egypt and other places around the world, and social media can be used as a tool for spreading important information fast, or can be used as a tool for spreading an agenda. This article discusses what the world thinks about social media and the problems of false information spreading and what people plan on doing about it.
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shared by sheldonmer on 17 Nov 14
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Why social media needs to be taught in high school | VentureBeat | Social | by Ronnie C... - 0 views
venturebeat.com/...ds-to-be-taught-in-high-school
social media high school education United States cybersecurity
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This article is slightly more off topic, but a great discussion either way. This article argues that social media and or "cyber-security" classes should be taught to high schoolers. I feel like this relate to my topic due to the large demographic of young people involved in the Egyptian Revolution. Although certain technologies might not have been available or were frowned on, learning about social media earlier in Egypt could've gotten the messages out way faster. I also feel like proper education for all people around the world would help prevent people from falling victim to false information on the internet and the agendas behind them. Being able to identify a threat is important in any situation, and although Egyptians used social media to fight against the regime, it later had very negative backlash, full of lies.
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Confirmed: Israel to Supply Gas to Egypt - Global Agenda - News - Arutz Sheva - 1 views
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In a 4 billion dollar deal an Israeli firm agreed to export natural gas to the Egyptian firm Dolphinus Holdings. 2.5 billion cubic meters gas will be exported from the Tamar offshore gas field in which US based Noble Energy owns 36%. The gas would be exported over the pipeline which Egypt had used to export gas to Israel before it was sabotaged 2 year ago. For more than a decade Israel had relied on Egypt for 40% of its gas under a 2005 export accord but Egypt annulled the treaty in April 2012 citing that Israel had not held up their financial obligation.
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shared by fcastro2 on 13 Feb 15
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Syrian Opposition Groups Wary Of Russia's Invitation To Moscow : NPR - 0 views
www.npr.org/...f-russias-invitation-to-moscow
russia opposition groups syria politics peace talks war
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U.N. envoy is pressing ahead on that front, while Russia tries to play peacemaker
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Russia is inviting the parties to Moscow this month, but some opposition groups won't go to a country that has been backing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad
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they provide weapons and advice to the Assad regime and they have taken an approach of cherry-picking who they talk to and who the regime talks to
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The U.S. is not pressuring the opposition groups it supports to go to Moscow. Instead it's suggesting they should think about it so that Russia can't blame the opposition for the diplomatic stalemate
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"If there are no guarantees as to the end state, that is, a movement towards a transitional government with full executive powers without Assad, then there is really no reason to go
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Russians aren't in a position to decide who will take part in future negotiations. And this has been the whole problem with their approach.
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He says the Russian job has always been to deliver the regime to the negotiating table, but the Syrian government only wants to talk about fighting terrorism, not discuss a political transition.
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We are hoping, more than expecting, that it will be a success," he says.De Mistura describes Syria as the largest humanitarian crisis since World War II
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They all agree that we need to do something to avoid that the Syrian conflict goes into a back burner and that movement towards some type of political solution should take place this year,"
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He says that's because Assad thinks he's winning — and U.S. plans to train and equip 5,000 moderate rebels a year won't help level the playing field.
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The rise of the self-proclaimed Islamic State and the U.S.-led airstrikes against that group in both Syria and Iraq now top the U.S. agenda.
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war in Syria has been raging for nearly four years and it's been challenging for diplomats to get warring sides to agree on even temporary truces.
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A daring plan to rebuild Syria - no matter who wins the war - Ideas - The Boston Globe - 0 views
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The first year of Syria’s uprising, 2011, largely spared Aleppo, the country’s economic engine, largest city, and home of its most prized heritage sites. Fighting engulfed Aleppo in 2012 and has never let up since, making the city a symbol of the civil war’s grinding destruction
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ven as the fighting continues, a movement is brewing among planners, activists and bureaucrats—some still in Aleppo, others in Damascus, Turkey, and Lebanon—to prepare, right now, for the reconstruction effort that will come whenever peace finally arrives.
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In a glass tower belonging to the United Nations’ Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, a project called the National Agenda for the Future of Syria has brought together teams of engineers, architects, water experts, conservationists, and development experts to grapple with seemingly impossible technical problems
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The team planning the country’s future is a diverse one. Some are employed by the government of Syria, others by the rebels’ rival provisional government. Still others work for the UN, private construction companies, or nongovernmental organizations involved in conservation, like the World Monuments Fund
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As the group’s members outline a path toward renewal, they’re considering everything from corruption and constitutional reform to power grids, antiquities, and health care systems.
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Aleppo is split between a regime side with vestiges of basic services, and a mostly depopulated rebel-controlled zone, into which the Islamic State and the Al Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front have made inroads over the last year
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The population exodus has claimed most of the city’s craftsmen, medical personnel, academics, and industrialists
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It took decades to clear the moonscapes of rubble and to rebuild, in famous targets like Dresden and Hiroshima but in countless other places as well, from Coventry to Nanking. Some places never recovered their vitality.
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Of course, Syrian planners cannot help but pay attention to the model closest to home: Beirut, a city almost synonymous with civil war and flawed reconstructio
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We don’t want to end up like Beirut,” one of the Syrian planners says, referring to the physical problems but also to a postwar process in which militia leaders turned to corrupt reconstruction ventures as a new source of funds and power
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Syria’s national recovery will depend in large part on whether its industrial powerhouse Aleppo can bounce back
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The city’s workshops, famed above all for their fine textiles, export millions of dollars’ worth of goods every week even now, and the economy has expanded to include modern industry as well.
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A river of rubble marks the no-man’s land separating the two sides. The only way to cross is to leave the city, follow a wide arc, and reenter from the far side.
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Parts of the old city won’t be inhabitable for years, he told me by Skype, because the ground has literally shifted as a result of bombing and shelling
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The first and more obvious is creating realistic options to fix the country after the war—in some cases literal plans for building infrastructure systems and positioning construction equipment, in other cases guidelines for shaping governanc
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They’re familiar with global “best practices,” but also with how things work in Syria, so they’re not going to propose pie-in-the-sky idea
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If some version of the current regime remains in charge, it will probably direct massive contracts toward patrons in Russia, China, or Iran. The opposition, by contrast, would lean toward firms from the West, Turkey, and the Gulf.
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At the current level of destruction, the project planners estimate the reconstruction will cost at least $100 billion
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Recently a panel of architects and heritage experts from Sweden, Bosnia, Syria, and Lebanon convened in Beirut to discuss lessons for Syria’s reconstruction—one of the many distinct initiatives parallel to the Future of Syria project.
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“You should never rebuild the way it was,” said Arna Mackic, an architect from Mostar. That Bosnian city was divided during the 1990s civil war into Muslim and Catholic sides, destroying the city center and the famous Stari Most bridge over the Neretva River. “The war changes us. You should show that in rebuilding.”
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Instead, Mackik says, the sectarian communities keep to their own enclaves. Bereft of any common symbols, the city took a poll to figure out what kind of statue to erect in the city center. All the local figures were too polarizing. In the end they settled on a gold-colored statue of the martial arts star Bruce Lee
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is that it could offer the city’s people a form of participatory democracy that has so far eluded the Syrian regime and sadly, the opposition as well.
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A great deal of money has been invested in Syria’s destruction— by the regime, the local parties to the conflict, and many foreign powers. A great deal of money will be made in the aftermath, in a reconstruction project that stands to dwarf anything seen since after World War II.
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2015 Education Year: Challenges ahead | Yemen Times - 1 views
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n Nov. 24, the prime minister declared 2015 “Education Year,” highlighting the need to improve the country’s educational system and its importance for Yemen’s future prosperity
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An ominous reminder came just 20 days after the prime minister’s announcement, when an explosive-laden car detonated at a checkpoint in Rada’a, killing 16 girls who were passing on their way home from school. The tragedy provides some indication of the immense challenges facing government and Yemeni society if 2015 is really to be a year for education.
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Speaking at a ceremony honoring the nation’s highest-achieving students for the 2013/14 school year,
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eeting these lofty goals will require a range of initiatives—repairing infrastructure and building new facilities, providing sufficient learning materials, narrowing teacher-student ratios, and addressing gender disparities—especially in rural areas, where underfunding and conflict have compounded the problems facing schools ther
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Mohammad bin Mohammad, a school teacher in Erman Primary School in the Ans area of Dhamar governorate, which accommodates 110 children from first to sixth grade, says many of his students are forced to take their lessons sitting on the ground. “Students don’t study in proper classrooms. Let alone having enough labs, chairs or tables,” he said.
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Addressing security concerns and providing necessary infrastructure are fundamental prerequisites, but staffing and improving access to education for girls remain high on the agenda.
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Government expenditure on bonuses amounts to YR60 million ($279,000) for the current fiscal year, and is expected to reach 271,696 employees nationwide working in the education sector, according to the Ministry of Education.
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In areas where female enrolment and retention in school is significantly lower than the national average, the government also offers conditional cash transfers to families to encourage them to allow their girls to attend school.
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This article highlights some of the challenges with improving girls education. Yemen has very little resources so taking resources from one place and giving to another-is basically like taking from students sitting on the dirt and giving to students sitting on rocks. There is also high security concerns. Many religious sects don't believe women should receive education. So girls and schools are being terrorized on the way to school. Some families don't believe the cash transfer is worth loosing children.