Heart-breaking letters from young children…

Daniel Pye, The Phnom Penh Post
Sat, 4 October 2014

This is a hell for children,” the letter reads. “I fled from war in Iraq but got stuck in harsh jail in Nauru where [there] is nothing but cruelty.”

The 15-year-old’s appeal is one of hundreds written by some of the 222 children, who are refugees or are seeking asylum in Australia, held on the tiny island nation of Nauru.

Many are impounded at camp OPC3, under the supervision of private Australian security firms. Conditions are dismal, and the inhabitants’ hopes of reaching Australia were dashed last week when the country inked a deal to resettle refugees in Cambodia.

In a series of submissions to the Australian Human Rights Commission’s ongoing inquiry into the country’s “off-shore processing” policy, children on Nauru have documented the suffering they endure in the camps.

“You’re nothing but a cult of racist liers [sic] [whose] aim is to kill the peoples even children on Nauru,” wrote one child. “Nauru is hell and you know everything about it … imagine [if] your children were in … our circumstances.”

Another child drew a row of dead refugees with nooses around their necks. Another, from Iran, scribbled a picture of Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott shooting a refugee. “Neither Iran, nor Australia, has freedom,” the child wrote.

Some of the scores of submissions to the Australian Human Rights Commission. Photo Supplied

The children described cramped, stuffy accommodation, inedible food crawling with insects and a lack of basic necessities like water and medical care.

In another submission, a child protection worker described the allegations of sexual abuse at the hands of guards that have emerged from the camp.

“Children have been sexually assaulted and threatened with sexual assault, and they are not allowed to leave the camp, even with family members able to care for them here.”

“Everyone here is depressed,” wrote one child. “F—k my life.”

Be a reflection of what you'd like to see in others. If you want love, give love, if you want honesty, give honesty, if you want respect, give respect. You get in return, what you give.

Always be yourself. Never try to hide who you are. The only shame is to have shame. Always stand up for what you believe in. Always question what other people tell you. Never regret the past…It's a waste of time. There's a reason for everything; Every mistake, every moment of weakness, every terrible thing that has happened to you. Grow from it. The only way you can ever get the respect of others is when you show them that you respect yourself… ~Unknown

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This footage was taken from Kicheche Bush Camp in the heart of the Olare Motorogi Conservancy in the Masai Mara by seven time Kicheche visitors Bill and Barbara Westbrook.

Report: ISIS Puts Literal Price Tags on Abducted Girls (ABC News)

By Lee Ferran, ABC, October 3, 2014

Members of the terror group ISIS are literally putting price tags on abducted women and girls to sell them as merchandise in a major Iraqi city, according to allegations cited in a new United Nations human rights report.

“UNAMI/OHCHR received a number of reports that an office for the sale of abducted women was opened in the al-Quds area of Mosul city,” says the report by the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) and the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). Mosul is Iraq’s second-largest city, much of which is controlled by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

“Women and girls are brought with price tags for the buyers to choose and negotiate the sale. The buyers were said to be mostly youth from the local communities. Apparently ISIL [ISIS] was ‘selling’ these Yezidi women to the youth as a means of inducing them to join their ranks,” the report says.

The Yezidis, or Yazidis, are a religious minority in Iraq who have been targeted along with Christians and Shias by ISIS, a Sunni extremist group.

“Some women managed to inform UNAMI/OHCHR that they had been forced to convert [to Islam] and were to be married to ISIL [ISIS] fighters and would be taken to destinations unknown,” says the report, which covers alleged human rights abuses in Iraq from July to September and was released Thursday.

The section on the persecution of Yazidi women was just one part of the 26-page report, which found overall that “gross human rights abuses and acts of violence of an increasingly sectarian nature, committed by armed groups, have exacerbated the effect on civilians and contributed to the deterioration in the human rights situation and the rule of law in many parts of the country.”

“These include attacks [by ISIS and associated groups] directly targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure, executions and other targeted killings of civilians, abductions, rape and other forms of sexual and physical violence against women and children, forced recruitment of children, destruction or desecration of places of religious or cultural significance, wanton destruction and looting of property, and denial of fundamental freedoms,” the report says.

UNAMI reported Wednesday more than 9,000 civilians are estimated to have been killed in Iraq this year alone.

The new report did not cover Syria, where heavy fighting between a number of armed groups including ISIS has been taking its own toll on a devastated civilian population for more than two years.

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Being a Nice Guy, doesn't mean you are a push over. It also doesn't mean you are easy to manipulate or take advantage of. No, being a Nice Guy simply means you care, have no time to get mad at the small stuff, and you think of the world in larger terms than self. And despite living in the shadow of the bad guys and paying for mistakes you didn't make, you hold on sometimes more than you should, but when you can no longer, you move on because it's the right thing to do. ~Eugene Nathaniel Butler

http://leelavadeeflower.blogspot.com/2014/10/simply-means-you-care.html

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If you find no one to support you on the spiritual path, walk alone. There is no companionship with the immature.
~Buddha, The Dhammapada

In war, both the winners and losers lose. ~Venerable Wuling

http://leelavadeeflower.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-spiritual-path.html

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I'm a bit busy. I will be here very soon
Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.

At the end of life we will not be judged by how many diplomas we have received, how much money we have made, how many great things we have done. We will be judged by "I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat, I was naked and you clothed me. I was homeless, and you took me in. ~Mother Teresa

http://leelavadeeflower.blogspot.com/2014/10/with-great-love.html

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How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong.  Because someday in your life you will have been all of these. ~George Washington Carver

It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.

When you make peace with yourself,
you make peace with the world. 

~Maha Ghosananda

Breathing in, I calm body and mind.
Breathing out, I smile.
Dwelling in the present moment
I know this is the only moment.

“Breathing in, I calm body and mind.” This line is like drinking a glass of ice water–you feel the cold, the freshness, permeate your body. When I breathe in and recite this line, I actually feel the breathing calming my body, calming my mind.

“Breathing out, I smile.” You know the effect of a smile. A smile can relax hundreds of muscles in your face, and relax your nervous system. A smile makes you master of yourself. That is why the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas are always smiling. When you smile, you realize the wonder of the smile.

“Dwelling in the present moment.” While I sit here, I don’t think of somewhere else, of the future or the past. I sit here and I know where I am. This is very important. We tend to be alive in the future, not now. We say, “Wait until I finish school and get my Ph. D. degree, and then I will be really alive.”

When we have it, and it’s not easy to get, we say to ourselves, “I have to wait until I get a job, in order to be *really* alive.” And then after the job, a car. After the car, a house. We are not capable of being alive in the present moment. We tend to postpone being alive to the future, the distant future, we don’t know when. Now is not the moment to be alive. We may never be alive in our entire life. Therefore, the technique, if we have to speak of a technique, is to be in the present moment, to be aware that we are here and now, and the only moment to be alive is the present moment.

“I know this is the only moment.” This is the only moment that is real. To be here and now, and enjoy the present moment is our most important task. “Calming. Smiling, Present moment, Only moment.” I hope you will try it.

~Thich Nhat Hanh