wfn.org | CWS Rebuilding Lives of Indonesia's 1.2 Million Displaced

[Carol Fouke <carolf@ncccusa.org>]

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A.
Contact: NCC News, 212-870-2227; news@ncccusa.org
5/11/01 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CWS SAVING, REBUILDING LIVES OF INDONESIA'S 1.2 MILLION DISPLACED

May 11, 2001, NEW YORK CITY -- Large areas of Indonesia, the world's fourth 
largest country, are caught in an unparalleled complex disaster, with some 
1.2 million Indonesians displaced by the double blow of an economic crisis 
and political upheaval.

More than half of those displaced have been forced from their communities 
by interreligious/interethnic conflict in the Maluku archipelago.  Others 
have been uprooted by the independence struggle in Aceh, ethnic conflict in 
West Kalimantan and interreligious violence in Central Sulawesi.  In West 
Timor, some 100,000 East Timorese remain displaced, according to the latest 
estimates.

There is little hope that displaced people living in camps or with host 
families will be leaving anytime soon.  Assistance will be needed over an 
extended period.

Church World Service Indonesia, operational for more than three decades, 
already is responding to the crisis in several parts of Indonesia.

Since the Asian economic crisis struck Indonesia in 1997, CWS has been 
implementing food-for-work programs principally in Sulawesi but also in 
Central and Eastern Java, Lomback and Nusa Tengara Timur with a total of 
$6.4 million in funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development. 
 Additional assistance has gone to East and West Timor and the Malukus.

Now CWS is launching a new, comprehensive program of assistance, aimed at 
saving lives and rebuilding livelihoods of internally displaced Indonesians 
and expanding and intensifying its ongoing assistance to displaced people.

The new, $1,437,000 program includes emergency food, shelter, water and 
sanitation; improvement of public health services including AIDS prevention 
and education; mental health and psycho-social counseling, and small 
business workshops and support for income-generating activities at the 
household level.

It also includes training in emergency disaster management, conflict 
resolution training and capacity building, with activities bringing 
together different religious and ethnic groups, engagement of local civic 
and religious leaders and strengthening of interfaith committees.

-end-