Social Watch E-Newsletter - Issue 180 - August 15, 2014

Social Watch calls on the international community to declare the Gaza Strip as an "international humanitarian disaster zone", as requested by the Palestinian NGOs. The flow of humanitarian assistance needs to be accelerated and civilians need to be protected. "The recurrence of these episodes in Gaza -says the Social Watch statement- is the result of not having acted before on similar war crimes and of not having pursued with good faith negotiations towards a lasting peace. The current ceasefire has to be maintained and the international community should back it proactively. Read more

Almost eleven years have passed since the US toppled Saddam Hussain’s regime, and Iraq still continues to struggle. In December 2013, Iraq national security forces stormed the private residence of the Iraqi Finance Minister, arresting several of his staff for supporting terrorism. This incident served as a trigger for sectarian violence throughout the Sunni triangle in southern Iraq – Al--‐Anbar Province. It was one of the areas that led peaceful demonstrations on February 2011, but subsequently witnessed the highest amount of sectarian violence, including government security force attacks on civilians.
The recent advancement of Islamic State of in Iraq and Syria (ISIS or Daesh) forces in Mosul and other areas in Iraq has caused great concern about the prospects of peace. Policymakers are scrambling to figure out an appropriate strategy to limit further advancement and prevent further security breakdown. Read more

The Arab NGO Network for Development (ANND) and the Arab Organization for Administrative Development (ARADO), in cooperation with ESCWA and the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, organized an Arab forum (on the 14-15 and 15 of July 2014) to discuss the challenges to the Post-2015 process and the potential obstacles against addressing the social and economic hardships that the region suffers from. The forum  brought about policy recommendations for the relevant regional and international processes,namely: The UNCTAD 50th Anniversary, the UN-GA 69th reunion, the Fourth round of the Economic, developmental and Social Summit of the League of Arab States (LAS).  Read more

The last few decades have seen two mutually reinforcing trends with regard to government budgets. First, though fiscal policy has long been seen as a key tool for governments to support stable economies and provide public services, the instrumental role of budgets in promoting development, redistributing wealth, and reducing poverty has been increasingly recognized. Second, this growing recognition of the importance of budgeting in addressing some of the world’s most persistent challenges has been a major factor in transparency and accountability becoming fashionable.
While budgets today have a global profile like never before, the lingo connecting public budgets to people’s lives has a clear precedent in the  International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights  (ICESCR), adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1966. Read more