Sozo Progress Report 2008An update on the work Sozo is doing in communities in Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, where medical, educational and economic development, and emergency relief are helping, healing and saving.

Sozo: To help, to heal, to save

Table of Contents

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Short-term Trips bring food, wheelchairs, perspective pp.3-4

Istalif clinic welcomes 220 babies p. 9

Barek Aub construction transforms village pp. 5-8

Shaka Dara boundary walls secure clinics p. 9

Sozo connects with grants, partners, military p. 10-11

Sozo captures media attention p. 12

Sri Lanka work continues p. 13

Short-term tripsFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Sozo teams bring food, wheelchairs to Afghan refugeesPartnerships, volunteers from Louisville, Memphis bring hope

LOUISVILLE, KY—November 12, 2008— Two small teams made up of Louisville and Memphis residents traveled to Kabul, Afghanistan, last month to help meet the needs of people now threatened by winter cold and food scarcity.

Along with continuing violence in Afghanistan the medical and food needs of refugees remain severe. Silk Road Development, a Memphis non-profit organization partnered with Sozo to distribute some $17,000 for food for refugees in October. “That definitely changed lives,” said Abdul Wakil, Sozo Afghanistan director. Silk Road founder and president,

Cindy Taylor, said her organization’s purpose is to assist Afghans in making transformational changes for their country through training and development of individuals in all spheres of influence, which include arts, business, education, family, government, media and medical. “Our intention is to aid in building capacity, which will renew hope within the hearts of all Afghans,” Taylor said. The Silk Road team also did medical work and offered hospice training and leadership training last month.

48 wheelchairs arrive for Afghans in need Volunteers from Southeast Christian Church partnered with Sozo to give out 48 wheelchairs donated by The Mobility Project, a non-profit humanitarian organization that refurbishes mobility aids such as wheelchairs, crutches, walkers and other medical equipment for the disabled in need. Louisville resident Jenny Smith, (pictured here) who has worked for Mobility Project in the past, helped bring mobility to some of the poorest of the poor last month in Afghanistan. “The need is never-ending in Afghanistan,” Smith said. “After 25 years of war, lack of health care and basic needs, the population of individuals with disability is higher than average.”

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Experienced both as a traveler and as a disabled person in a wheelchair herself, Smith said, “A chair is as unique as a pair of shoes,” Smith said. “It must fit properly.”

Trips Progress: In 2008, Sozo hosted 16 short-term trips to Afghanistan. Teams arrived every month but one to the Kabul guest house in 2008. And in November Sozo and Flatirons Community Church cancelled a trip due to security concerns.

4 teams from Flatirons Community Church, Lafayette, Colorado

6 teams from Silk Road Development, Memphis, Tennessee, Cindy Taylor

2 teams from Southeast Christian Church, Louisville, Kentucky, Ben Thornley

1 Global Health Outreach team, the Christian Medical and Dental

Association; 1 team from PROeM in Poland; 1 Sozo auditing trip; 1 Sozo Vision Trip

April 29, 2008 Things are not good here—30 years of war have led to corruption, poverty and poor health and education facilities-- if they exist here at all. Afghanistan has enemies in and around its borders. Natural disasters have taken their toll. But we don’t see complacency or an acceptance of their situation. People are working or they actively look for work. New infrastructure is being built. Food is being grown. The beggars we do see have reached a level of desperation

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and need rarely seen in the United States. And we see the Afghan workers here with Sozo, spending day after day making tangible differences in their community and their country that most people can only dream about, and that’s something we’ve been proud to be a part of.--Written by John Eisel in his travel blog for the Rocky Mountain News Your Hub Web site, during a trip with Flatirons Community Church in April, 2008.

Barek AubBuilding health: Construction completed on medical clinic

Sozo began offering medical care to IDPs at Barek Aub in December 2007. A makeshift clinic in a community member’s

house began in January 2008, with services three days a week. Sozo supplied medical personnel, supplies and medicines. Sozo also began training Community Health Workers (CHW) in Barek Aub in late January. Sozo staff and volunteers educated 20 men and 20 women in

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The clinic building construction began in the

spring of 2008. The building was topped off in August and

completed in November.

Clinic Patient Visits 20087,315

Average visits per month732

the causes and prevention of colds.

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Educating a communitySozo held training sessions in Community Development Education at the guesthouse in Kabul with Victor Chen, the Afghanistan National Coordinator for Community Development Consultants, the NGO that has been assisting Carree Stewart with CDE for Sozo and with health lessons.

Sozo’s top trainers, Latifa Shafaq of Kabul, and Haji Haider of Istalif trained trainers March 23-27. Several representatives from Barek Aub attended along with Sozo staff and community volunteers from Istalif.

Further training with seven women and 24 men from Barek Aub, August 12-16 at the Sozo guesthouse in Kabul created a leadership committee for the village.

The committee represents each ethnic group at Barek Aub and after the training they selected more community health educators to work in the village.

During training needs surfaced in the following order:

1. Transportation2. Jobs3. Mosque4. Unity and Honesty

Housing needs that surfaced during earlier community meetings have been met for many. Delays due to re-mapping and property allocations pushed back the building of homes for identified widows and disabled residents of Barek Aub to early spring 2009.

Education was also voiced as a need among the community in 2007. Sozo broke ground on a permanent school building for the

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hundreds of students who met in a large canvas tent in 2007. Their school was completed in November, 2008.

Survey reveals economic needSozo conducted a household census and health survey in Barek Aub in early Spring, 2008, which revealed that 90 percent of the workforce population is unemployed with no significant source of income. Some 79 percent of households at Barek Aub reported living on less than the equivalent of $1 per person per day.

The Afghan Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation (MORR) plans to resettle some

13,000 internally displaced people to Barek Aub in the next 3-5 years. So settling the economic question while the 2,000-acre area 50 km northeast of Kabul is home to only 3,000 will lead to better medical and educational development with the influx of more people. Another factor revealed by the survey, however, is the fact that the majority of villagers are children 14 and younger, and the population is nearly evenly split between men and women.

The survey also revealed a medical concern about infant deaths. Barek Aub reported 57 births and 38 deaths—12 of which were infants, in one year.

Water stays in the desert

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Survey says:

90 percent unemployed

13,000 people coming in 3-5 years

The final phase of the deep well and water project for Barek Aub was completed in 2008. Following the development of roads in the Afghan government plan for the village, workers dug trenches for water pipes to transport the deep well water throughout the area with several spigots for community use. Piping extends 1.5 kilometers from the pump house to the town site. Taps were placed every 30 to 50 meters to allow villagers convenient access to water.

Emergency relief distributions: Hunger increases with rising food costs

s a boy, Wakil Zada felt the gnaw of hunger in his stomach often. Like thousands of other Afghans, his family lived in a refugee camp. There hunger was as much a part of each day as a meal. Wakil came to understand the

kind of hunger that goes away after a couple days without a meal, only to turn to pain as the body cries out for food.

ANow national director of Sozo Afghanistan, this year Wakil remembered that hunger again as he traveled to Barek Aub. Wakil found the community hungry often. Children, families, women, pregnant and nursing mothers, with nothing but the most meager of sustenance—often not even daily bread.

“The cost of the items are so high I don’t know how they are living,” Zada said.

The increasing cost of even the most basic of foods, i.e., grain, oil, tea, salt, and sugar, in world markets makes life most difficult for the

poorest of the poor such as the families who live in Barek Aub. “The package we were distributing last year was costing about 40 dollars,” Zada said. “It is almost double or more now.”

Sozo offered emergency food and fuel relief four times in 2008, giving out packages with items such as charcoal, matches, cooking

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oil, flour, beans, sugar, tea, salt, peas and rice for the nearly 600 families in Barek Aub.

Relief Distributions 2008:

Jan. 2008 – Food and fuel

Feb. 2008 – Food and fuel

Aug. 2008 – Food and fuel

Oct. 2008 – Food and fuel 

IstalifMedical development: patients, disease decrease as CHWs increasePatient visits dropped in 2008 at the medical clinic Sozo continues to fund in Istalif. From an average of 1,364 patients each month in 2007, visits decreased to an average 1,112 patients each month in 2008.

The Community Development Education program added five more Community Health Workers and increased the number of households receiving CDE lessons from 281 a month in 2007 to 325 a month in 2008.

Leishmaniasis has dropped to its lowest level since 2005. After a spike in treatment visits in 2007, treatments between January and September, 2008 fell to 1,160.

The clinic welcomed 220 babies born in Istalif in 2008—up from 36 born there in 2007 with the new 24-hour labor and delivery service and on-site, female OB-

GYN doctor.

Education development: Sozo supports teachersSozo continued to provide lunch and transportation for teachers in Istalif in 2008.

Shaka Dara10

Patient visits also dropped in Behzadi, where Sozo continues to fund the staff and supplies for the medical clinic. There clinic workers saw an average of 633 patients per month, compared to 750 in 2007.

Patient visit increased in Qale Marudbek, from 840 per month in 2007, to 943 per month in 2008.

Sozo completed the boundary walls around both clinics this year, as requested by each community to increase the security at the clinic sites.

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Sozo ConnectionsIn 2008 Sozo strengthened ties with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to participate cooperatively with them in several community distributions. In late November Sozo and ISAF partnered to distribute 250 backpacks of winter clothing to the families at Barek Aub.

ISAF provides assistance to refugee camp

More than 22 pallets of donations from around the world were unpacked from trucks to be handed out to the people. Barek Aub is largest refugee camp in the vicinity of Kabul, and is home to more than 600 families and 3000 displaced individuals.

KABUL, Afghanistan - Servicemembers and civilian volunteers from the International Security Assistance Force partnered with non-governmental organization Sozo International to bring help and hope to refugees at Barek Aub, a camp for displaced individuals and families located outside Bagram, Afghanistan, 31 October.

Seventy ISAF volunteers in 10 vehicles made the trip to unload 22 pallets of donations from around the world. Socks and shoes, blankets, warm winter jackets, soccer balls, notebooks and crayons were just a few of the items passed out.

“There was a big difference between this and the last refugee camp I went to,” said Master Sergeant Alex Czodel of the Romanian Army. “This was worse. They are in the open, far away from the city. There are a lot of things to be done here, a lot of work to do, a lot of help needed.”

“We brought thirty boxes from the Army of [the Former Yugoslav Republic of] Macedonia,” said Army Captain Valil Matavsqi, a citizen of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. “Everything was new and approved by our government. We brought them from [the Former Yugoslav Republic of] Macedonia by plane, and we divided it to all the people here.”

One thousand family packs made from U.S. donations were carefully organized by Sozo International, were also a huge part of the hand out to Barek Aub’s refugees. Additionally, two hundred and sixty-seven needy families received a rucksack full of necessities courtesy of the Norwegian Army. 

“I think it’s very apparent that the non-governmental organizations and the Afghan government are working to help this particular group. They have the school, the clinic, they have everything right there,” said Staff Sergeant Matthew Morgan of the U.S. Marines. “It was a lot like a little town, a community, but you could definitely see they were in need of things.”

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The Barek Aub refugee camp is the largest in the vicinity of Afghanistan’s capital city, Kabul, housing 600 families and 3,000 displaced individuals.

Hopeful HeartsSozo facilitated donations of shoes and coats to the street children who attend the Aschiana School in Kabul. Some 465 children received brand new shoes, socks and coats purchased locally, and handed out by Flatirons Community Church team members during their January/February, 2008 trip. Hopeful Hearts also sent hygiene kits and blessing bags filled with toys, candies, school supplies and other items. The chaplain program from Camp Eggers joined in with Hopeful Hearts and donated five large cartons of school supplies and gave $500 to the food program at Aschiana.

Hopeful Hearts also gave blessing bags to the 650 school-aged children at Barek Aub, and coats and shoes to all 1,000 children at the camp in late November and early December.

Sozo Grant Work: Burn Project    According to IRIN News, at least 47 self-immolation cases were recorded in six months of 2008 by Herat city hospital alone. Only seven of these women survived. The other 40 died.

Women’s rights activists fear the burning phenomenon is increasing. At least 184 cases of self-immolation were registered by the AIHRC in 2007 compared to 106 in 2006.

Through U.S. government grants and a partnership with the Afghanistan’s Ministry of Public Health (MoPH), Sozo International is working to

implement a burn prevention program targeted at women and children in Kabul, Nangahar and Herat provinces.

In addition to self-immolation, a majority of burn traumas are reported by women and children who are responsible for household cooking over

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fires or with propane. Heating with wood or propane also leads to many burn injuries.

The success of this partnership as an example of the kind of medical diplomacy that can help stabilize Afghanistan was mentioned in a recent article by Donald F. Thompson in Defense Horizons.

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Sozo in the newsShort-term trips led to more media attention for Sozo in 2008. Flatirons Community Church members Bob and Patty Tunnell started their own Web site: BarekAub.com, and painted that on one of their race cars to advertise their newly adopted cause on the track. Colorado School of Mines Quarter Back, David Pesek, who traveled with a Flatirons team to Afghanistan in June, 2008, spent much of his sports news press conference talking about the work in Afghanistan. That in turn led to a mention in several sports articles. In addition, two military publications highlighted the work being done by Sozo in Afghanistan. Then in

December, 2008, Sozo’s Afghanistan national director was honored.

Sozo Afghanistan national director commended by KarzaiKABUL, Afghanistan, December 2008 -- Sozo Afghanistan national director, Wakil Mihrabi Zada, received commendation from Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai in a special visit to his office to celebrate the December Eid holiday this month. Each year the President invites a few Afghans who

have come to his notice as having been working hard to rebuild the country. Wakil said he was honored to be invited. He has been working with Sozo since 2002.

Publication Summary Date

Albuquerque Journal Mother, daughter team of nurses take time off from New Mexico hospital work to help bring healthcare to rural, poor in Afghanistan in 2008.

12-15-08

ISAF News Release International Security Assistance Force volunteers join Sozo to distribute supplies from around the world in Barek Aub, Afghanistan.

11-5-08

Rocky Mountain News

Colorado School of Mines QB mentions summer work with Afghan refugees in Barek Aub.

10-27-08

Boulder Daily Camera A Colorado couple, Bob and Patty Tunnell, is using a race car to raise awareness and funds for Sozo's work with refugees in Afghanistan.

10-13-08

The Oredigger Colorado School of Mines starting quarterback David Pesek says trip to Afghanistan was "single greatest experience" of his life.

9-1-08

The Southeast Outlook   pdf

Report on the starvation that threatens an Afghan refugee camp without humanitarian food relief and aid.

7-31-08

Sports Illustrated Vault

Colorado School of Mines starting quarterback David Pesek's trip to Afghanistan highlighted in summer accomplishments.

7-28-08

Defense Horizons pdf "The Role of Medical Diplomacy in Stabilizing Afghanistan" by Colonel Donald F. Thompson

5-08

The Spencer Magnet Kentucky kindergarten teacher, Nichole Hutchins, engages American students in collecting school supplies for Afghan kids.

5-21-08

YourHub.com Colorado group helps Afghan refugees with water, food, shelter, medicine. 1-7-08

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Sri LankaSozo continues to fund the work of Kithu Sevana Ministries in the Galle District, Sri Lanka. This organization works in post-tsunami rehabilitation and development.

Kithu Sevana is building a new church facility and continues to operate a vocational center in Batticaloa.

In an area where the 2004 tsunami took away not only homes and tools, but also the confidence of the people to generate new income, Kithu Sevana is working to establish a center with workshops for sewing and professional dressmaking, carpentry and motor mechanics. This center will be a place where skilled community members can work and earn a regular income, with a small percentage of the funds earned being returned to the community group for maintenance of the center. This center can also provide training for young people in these vocations, and be part of a system of apprenticeship. 

The Ministries are also renovating and setting up costs for a counseling and retreat center in Hikkaduwa, and a school center for English and computer classes in Hikkaduwa.

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About Sozo InternationalSozo International began in 2002, in response to the opportunity presented by the liberation of Afghanistan from Taliban forces, shortly after September 11, 2001. In 2005, following the Indian Ocean tsunami of Dec. 26, 2004, Sozo began work in Sri Lanka, with communities heavily impacted by the disaster. Sozo aims to reach the

most impoverished people in identifiable communities where war and natural disaster have wreaked havoc. Sozo aims to provide emergency and ongoing relief

for internally displaced people (IDP) and to encourage development with education, health and economic initiatives aimed at changing the day-to-day existence of

people in need as well as providing for their future.

www.sozointernational.org

Sozo International, PO Box 436967, Louisville, KY 40253 ● (502) 253-4308 ● Fax (502) 266-6075 ● e-mail info@sozointernational.org.

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