Threatened humanitarian and charity societies prepares for first conference

The Arab Human Rights committee will hold a conference in Paris on January 9th that will bring together several humanitarian and charity societies and, UN experts, non governmental organizations, UNESCO, the UNICEF, and WHO, in order to discuss in particular the effects of September 11 attacks on these organizations and to study their own problem at the beginning of the Third Millennium.

The conference will be held under the title "Paris's conference for humanitarian and charity societies," in the presence of several number of Arab and international figures including former militant President of south African Nelson Mandella, the Sudanese Lt. Gen. Abdul Rahman Sewar al-Zahab, Bishop Hlarion Capuuci, Abdul Aziz al-Nweidi, former advisor for the Moroccan prime minister and several human rights activists, including Violette Dagher, the chairperson of the Arab committee for human rights.

Topics of the conference which is considered the first of its kind concentrate on three main issues, which are: the results of unilateral globalization on charity societies due to containment, investment or interference and its impact on the international humanitarian law and the international law for human rights; A field study to monitor the situations of charity societies in selected countries like Afghanistan, Palestine and Egypt, and listening to the project of improving IT and militant contacts between Non- Governmental Organizations; and Evaluating the performance of the Islamic international societies and the extent of their ability to meet humanitarian needs at times of peace and wars.

The conference will be attended by several groups from the Gulf states especially that their charity activity was exposed to great pressure since the September attacks against the US where every charity or humanitarian work has become suspicious. This will make of the conference a meeting point between Islamic and international charity societies.

The preparatory statement of the conference reads "September 11 for the humanitarian societies in the North was just a date, but as for southern societies, especially the Islamic ones it was a catastrophe by all means. The matter has changed from just mere harassment into unprecedented actual war by the US administration against all societies of Islamic traits."