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From the Editors for the Period 9 to 16 February 2025


Feature: Gautam Banerji
gives us a first glimpse of the 2025 XUNICEF Reunion that took place in Manila. About 60 former colleagues attended and apparently enjoyed culinary delights and witnessed the cultural diversity from Metro Manila to Bohol. We also do have two photo albums from Manila (click here) and the excursion to Bohol (click here) which presently contains 150  and 50 photos respectively. If you have attended the Reunion and do wish to contribute photographs, you can upload them directly into the albums. We are sure that someone is working on a full report of the gathering, which we will post here once received.

The last Executive Board session ended with an eclat on Friday last week, and continues to stir the thoughts of colleagues. The US delegation had forced a vote on five CPDs on grounds of their purported diversity, equality and inclusion and accessibility (DEIA) agenda which according to the delegation discriminates against hard working Americans; the USA also doesn’t wish to support any gender ideology. Niloufar Pourzand liked the closing statement by Germany on behalf of 25 countries. Kul Gautam shares his thoughts on the vote. So has Detlef Palm, who arrives at a very different conclusion about the directions the Board should take.

Before we forget: Happy 90th Birthday Horst Cerni!

Niloufar Pourzand is asking all of us what  we could do about the "unprecedented onslaught on multilateralism..."; she also has some suggestions. Click here, and leave your comments.

Myra Rudin shared what has become the Photo of the Week.

Nuzhat Shahzadi recalls her time in her grandparents’ village homestead, and how her mother became the Medicine Woman – helping others where there was no doctor.

Ken Gibbs continues with more Glimpses of Tehran back in 2003, where he was working for the Mercy Corps and, at least on occasion, smoking the hubble-bubble and trying to buy carpets.

Ramesh Shrestha meditates about the connection between neuroscience and social media, wondering about necessary decisions to be taken by media regulators.

Donald Trump’s funding freeze has dominated the news for the aid industry/ development community. We have a statement of American Human Rights Experts and current and former members of UN bodies; and about the threatened security at ISI camps in Syria.

Niloufar Purzand shared an article that appeared in Foreign Policy: How Gaza Shattered the West’s Mythology .

Tom McDermott has, as usual, prepared a summary of news articles that have not appeared on our blog and that you may have missed

Sandra Haji Ahmed is not well. Her son is providing her contact to former colleagues who wish to send a note of encouragement.

New Members: Here is a list of former colleagues who have joined XUNICEF since July 2024

Missing You:

Kunio Waki, RIP. Kunio was an avid photographer and active on social media.

A WFP staff member identified as Ahmed died in captivity in Yemen.
Detlef Palm
Editor of the Week

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