2008 Wenchuan earthquake: Tourism cleanup to ensure respect

Many survivors of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake have made a living commemorating the dead.

Thousands of residents in Sichuan province - especially farmers whose fields were destroyed - turned to selling souvenirs and giving tours of the rubble.

Five years later, the tourism sector's chaos has been brought to order, as have other facets of life, in places such as Yingxiu town.

Two years ago, the entrance of the Cave of 10,000 Dead - a mass grave created when authorities needed to dispose of more than 6,000 bodies before an epidemic broke out - swarmed with vendors selling flowers, funerary money and incense, as well as photos and DVDs for tourists to take home.

They are now gone - or at least largely replaced by licensed vendors in designated bamboo stalls out of sight of the Cave of 10,000 Dead.

"We can sell quake photos but not DVDs," 26-year-old vendor Yang Hong explains. "The government says the footage is too graphic and disrespectful to the dead."

However, he says many vendors still stock such videos. Customers must first ask for them, then sellers retrieve them from hiding.

Tours are now regulated, too. Feng Xueying says she started earning money last year by leading sightseers around the ruins of Xuankou Middle School, a large boulder cleaved from a mountain during the quake and the Cave of 10,000 Dead.

"I was a housewife before the disaster and opened a store afterward, but business wasn't so good," the 31-year-old says. "There were a lot of people giving tours, so I tried it. I made about 1,000 yuan ($160) a month running the shop but two to three times that as a guide.

"A lot of outsiders were curious. I was happy to show the changes we've undergone since 2008."

Soon after, the government required guides to pass exams, become licensed and work for authorized agencies.

Feng obtained a tour-guide permit that allows her to take people only to the school, boulder and graveyard. But she returned to her store after getting the license.

"I have more freedom running the shop," she says. "I'm my own boss. If I work for a company, I have to do what they say and go where they say, and when they say to.

"I also have to take care of my son," she says, adding that the boy studies in neighboring Dujiangyan city. "He's not a very good student. I must help him. I need to focus on him."

While the new regulations have cut into Feng's earnings, she supports them.

"There weren't any standards," she explains. "Different guides charged different prices, and there was no quality control. Now, there's a plan and order. Our tourism industry is improving, and that's good for the town."

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2013-05/11/content_16491962.htm

Documenting Afghan mass graves

University of Lincoln lecturer Gillian Fowler is just back from Afghanistan, where she has been teaching Afghans how to properly document mass graves and identify bodies from 35 years of conflict. Here, the forensic anthropologist tells reporter Paul Whitelam about her work.

In a nation torn apart by war and riddled with corruption, cold hard science is the surest keeper of truth.

And in future, the work of Gillian Fowler, consulting forensic anthropologist for Physicians for Human Rights (PHR), could finally give families the answers they have longed for.

Ms Fowler has been training local Afghans in human osteology – the study of bones – and exhumation techniques.

She has been working on a three-year project called Securing Afghanistan's Past with the Afghan Forensic Science Organisation, set up through PHR.

Documenting burial sites and educating people to preserve them means atrocities committed by tribes, the Taliban, the Soviets and the mujahideen can be fully investigated.

And perhaps, at some point, ordinary Afghans will see justice, or at least reconciliation.

"There's a great deal of construction work going on in Afghanistan, such as road building, where human remains are dug up and often just thrown into skips," said Ms Fowler.

"Another issue is families have exhumed some graves but bodies have not been identified. People just say: 'That's my father', for example.

"The people we train need to know the difference between human and animal bones, which is where I came in.

"We looked at a grave with the Ministry of Interior where there were two human skeletons and lots of bones from animals butchered around the Soviet invasion era.

"You need to know how many people are in a grave and once you can identify those individuals you can then do a biological profile to establish the age, sex, stature and ancestry at the time of death."

As a result of the project a report has just been published to challenge the Afghan government to properly protect graves.

It also calls for the legal recognition of people's rights to know what really happened to their missing relatives.

Ms Fowler became involved in the project having previously spent several years working for the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala, where she was involved in exhuming graves of innocent victims of genocide from the 1980s.

"In Afghanistan we use the example of Guatemala," she said.

"At the moment the General is being tried in court 21 years after the genocide there.

"Local people and witnesses know where the graves are.

"We are probably talking 20 to 30 years before Afghanistan has some sort of justice or reconciliation."

Ms Fowler said working in Afghanistan, where crime scenes are often unprotected, is full of challenges.

"Kabul is dusty and dirty and traffic is so chaotic – there are no rules of the road," she said.

"There are bombed out buildings and you can still see bullet holes in lamp posts.

"The main risk in Kabul is not that of being killed by suicide bombs – it's being involved in a car accident, the mob dragging you out of the car and killing you.

"No one knows what's going to happen after the foreign troops leave at the end of 2014.

"Our work has the full support of the Ministry of Interior. But we do not work for any one side. We are completely impartial. We'll deal with a mass grave whether it's Taliban prisoners or anyone else."

Colleague Stefan Schmitt, who directs PHR's International Forensic Programme and was the report's lead author, previously worked with Gillian in Guatemala.

The paper was presented at the Truth Seeking and the Role of Forensic Science conference in Kabul last month.

Mr Schmitt said: "Since 1978, Afghans have continuously lived through protracted cycles of violence that included massive human rights violations and war crimes with virtual impunity for many of the perpetrators.

"Healing such deep wounds is a complex and lengthy process.

"What is needed from both the government of Afghanistan and the international community is a serious commitment to a vision for a better future – and that includes addressing the wrongs of the past."

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://www.thisislincolnshire.co.uk/Lincoln-lecturer-helps-Afghans-document-mass/story-18933578-detail/story.html#axzz2SzuY62Xq

Migori flash flood kill more than 10, sweep away bridges

Floods have swept away several bridges in Migori county. County residents fear for their lives as flash floods continue to wreak havoc. More than 10 people have been killed in the county.

Several estates in Migori town have been cut off after the bridges on rivers Nyasare and Onyinjo were damaged. “With the constant rains every evening we are forced to rush home or risk being cut off as water overflows the culverts,” Brian Okoth, a resident, said. Three bridges have been affected with some of their sections being swept away by floods.

Residents of Oruba, Milimani and Sangla estates in Suna West constituency and their Nyasare, Magina and Nyikendo estates in Suna East constituency are calling on their CDF committees to speed up building the bridges.

“We need to build stronger and more bridges as constant rains and floods make the culverts weaker,” said Valentine Ogongo, a local leader. In Nyatike district the Angubo bridge connecting Muhuru Bay, Sori and Lwanda towns have been weakened by constant flooding.

“When it rains, the bridge overflows, blocking school children and bringing transport to a stand-still with most risking death as the bridge is weakened,” Richard Bitonga, the police boss said.

Bitonga said the condition of the bridge has affected distribution of relief food at camps as cars transporting food are sometimes forced to unpack longer distance from camps. “The government should take the plea by residents and the Red Cross officials to build the bridge on time,” he said.

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-119911/migori-flash-flood-kill-10-sweep-away-bridges

Coal mine explosion in southwestern China kills 12, injures 2

Twelve people were killed and two others injured in a colliery gas explosion on Friday evening in southwest China's Guizhou Province, local authorities said on Saturday.

The accident occurred at around 8:30 p.m. Friday in the Dashan coal mine in Pingba county, said the Guizhou Provincial Administration of Work Safety.

The injured people were in hospital and an investigation into the explosion is underway.

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-05/11/c_132374385.htm

Eight dead, 11 missing in Mizoram thunder squall

Thunderstorm and landslides have claimed eight lives, rendered 11 missing and left 25 others injured in the state capital, police said on Saturday.

Nine houses in Laipuitland locality here were swept away in a massive landslide early this morning, killing eight persons, Superintendent of Police (Traffic) Lallianmawia, who was supervising the rescue work, said.

Eleven persons were missing and 9 others injured in the landslide, he said.

Rescue work was underway with volunteers and policemen searching the debris for bodies and survivors, he said.

Eleven persons were missing and nine others injured in the landslide, he said.

Lallianmawia said that six bodies have been recovered and two bodies were being dug out adding that the number of missing persons might rise.

Thunderstorm accompanied by strong squall hit the Mizoram capital last night. At least 16 people across the city suffered minor injuries in the storm and were given first aid at the Civil Hospital here, the police official said.

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/eight-dead-11-missing-in-mizoram-thunder-squall/article4705492.ece

Sri Lankan court orders probe on mass grave, DNA tests ordered

A Sri Lankan court Friday ordered a full investigation into a mass grave found last year in the island nation's Central Province, a lawyer said.

The magistrate in Matale instructed the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) to submit a comprehensive report to the court by the end of this month, Xinhua reported.

The CID was also ordered to record statements of 13 petitioners who claimed that their relatives were believed to have been buried at the site.

Sunil Watagala, the lawyer appearing on behalf of the petitioners, said the magistrate also ordered a DNA test on the skeletal remains found in Matale.

Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa last month decided to appoint a special commission to investigate the mass grave. The investigation by the commission will be in addition to the probe carried out by police.

Over 150 skeletal remains have been unearthed from the mass grave.

Forensics have determined that the remains were of people killed sometime in the late 1980s and the area has now been marked as a crime scene.

At least 10 skeletal remains were first found from the site in November last year by construction workers when land near a hospital was dug up to construct a new building.

Following police investigation, excavation began to look for skeletal remains at the site, and more human bones were found.

A Marxist political party, the JVP, has demanded that the government carry out an investigation on the mass grave following fears that the remains may be that of JVP members or supporters killed during insurgency in 1987-89.

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://www.newstrackindia.com/newsdetails/2013/05/10/241--Sri-Lankan-court-orders-probe-on-mass-grave-.html

Accra stadium May 9 disaster victims remembered

A wreath-laying ceremony was held at the Accra Sports Stadium to mark the 12th anniversary of the disaster which claimed 127 soccer fans in 2001.

Thursday's ceremony was attended by government officials, soccer fans, administrators and family members of those killed, reports Xinhua.

More than 127 soccer fans died May 9, 2001, in a tragic incident at the stadium during a local premier league match between Ghana's two most successful football clubs, Accra Hearts of Oak and arch rivals Kumasi Asante Kotoko.

The police fired tear gas into the stands in their efforts to control rioting fans after Hearts overturned a one-goal deficit to lead 2-1, resulting in a stampede during which 127 fans lost their lives while attempting to escape.

Hundreds more were seriously injured during the incident described by aficionados of the game as Africa's worst ever stadium disaster and the world's third.

The May 9 stadium incident affected the overall spectatorship to premier league centers across the West African country, with club officials grieving over low proceeds until the Ghana Football Association (GFA) employed a stadium insurance policy two years ago to provide cover to mitigate losses that might arise from such incidents and create a center of attention to fans.

A Muslim prayer session for the departed souls led by representatives of the National Chief Imam, Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharubutu, and officials of the two clubs was held at Nima, a community within the capital, which recorded most casualties.

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2013-05/10/content_16489697.htm

Lahore inferno: Rescuers pull out 17 more bodies from LDA plaza

Rescue workers recovered 17 more bodies on Friday before firemen managed to extinguish the blaze that had engulfed the nine-storey Lahore Development Authority (LDA) building.

With the discovery of more bodies, police say the death toll from a building fire has climbed to 25, surging from Thursday’s figure of eight fatalities. Fifteen people were reportedly missing.

According to DG Rescue Services, Dr Rizwan, the fire was brought under control at around 4 am.

“Upon entering the ninth floor, four hours later, we saw several bodies lying near the main entrance, completely charred and beyond recognition,” he said.

Firefighters could not speculate the final death toll, as they are still finding burnt bodies.

A 10-member “body identification team” has been constituted by DG rescue services, which will be headed by Dr Imam Syed and Dr Ahsan Mian.

Firemen also faced difficulties during the rescue mission. As many as four firefighters fell unconscious due to the smoke and heat inside the building.

One firefighter – identified as Azmatullah – received serious burns and was transferred to CMH.

“The fire safety commission will issue notices to owners who haven’t provided adequate fire exits and alarm systems in their building,” Dr Rizwan said.

When asked about the cause of the incident, the LDA Employees Union said there was “foul play” involved in the incident.

He said “records of a hundred employees, who were hired on back dates, were stored in the building,” which could have possibly irked people to set fire to certain floors in the building.

“Approximately 200 files of disputed plots in Iqbal Town, Mustafa Town and Johar Town as well as ledger books, litigation records, inquiry reports and other important data was also kept here,” Rasheed said.

The sixth floor of the plaza remained completely safe, because the duct system was disconnected there. The inferno, however, gutted at least four floors of the building. Rescuers said there were deep cracks on the roof top as well.

The structural engineer of the plaza said that construction of the building is done in a manner that it won’t fall, even after such a massive fire.

Saturday 11 May 2013

http://tribune.com.pk/story/547291/lahore-inferno-rescuers-pull-out-17-more-bodies-from-lda-plaza/