Europe Newsletter Spring 2021

Spring is upon us and as we embark upon a new beginning and a new year, we look ahead to the future with optimism and hope.

We are very grateful that with the continuous support from our donors, our dedicated staff and volunteers have been able to pursue FOCUS’ life transforming initiatives and projects during these particularly challenging times.

Over the past nine months, FOCUS has been providing humanitarian assistance to families in several countries, including Turkey and Syria, whose lives have been disrupted by Covid-19 and this will continue to be an important aspect of our work in the year ahead.

To celebrate International Women’s Day, we would like to acknowledge the critical role of our 25,000 female search and rescue volunteers who have been trained by FOCUS and AKAH over the past 23 years. They remain core to our disaster and emergency management operations especially in Pakistan, Tajikistan and Afghanistan.

This newsletter also contains a few more highlights and updates from our projects over the last several months.

Don’t forget you can now donate to FOCUS Europe via AmazonSmile at no cost.

Our best wishes to you and your families on the occasion of Navroz.

FOCUS Europe Board of Trustees

Top Stories

Shamim Bano, a middle-school teacher in Pakistan, has recently returned from a fortnight in Kabul where she trained Afghan women in search and rescue work. As a young girl, Bano was disturbed by some of the cultural challenges that came in the way of rescue. "Often men found it awkward to save purdah-observing women during a disaster, leaving them to die", she said. In 2008, she seized the opportunity to become a Search and Rescue volunteer for the Aga Khan Agency for Habitat (AKAH), which FOCUS support.

Bano is one of 50,000 volunteers, half of them women, whom FOCUS and AKAH Pakistan have trained in community-based disaster risk management since 1998. Bano's first big rescue mission was in 2010 when a massive landslide hit the village of Attabad in the Hunza valley. The Attabad lake broke its banks leaving 6,000 people homeless.

Bibi Nusrat, a nurse from Karimabad, has worked as a training officer for AKAH since 2000. She visits disaster-prone villages to train communities in how to protect themselves and in 2020, she visited 15 avalanche-prone villages in Chitral. For Nusrat, the March 2016 avalanche in Susoom was an event she could never forget. She spent two weeks in a tent, braving snow storms and rain to care for dead bodies, the unconscious and the injured.
To read more about Bano and Nusrat and other incredible women at AKAH, click here

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to constrain the already challenging settlement process for those who have been displaced and are trying to rebuild their lives in Europe. The pandemic has led to delays in processing asylum applications and for those who have received asylum, there have been difficulties in securing and maintaining employment. All these issues also contribute significantly towards poorer mental health.

FOCUS continues to provide one-on-one support to the Jamat and we currently have over 500 active cases across Europe.

Our highly dedicated team of staff and volunteers have enabled 75% of asylum seekers to achieve residency status, 70% to secure rented accommodation, 45% above the age of 5 to improve their language competencies and 40% above the age of 18 to find pathways into employment.

As the Jamat progresses along the “settlement continuum” from “recently arrived” to “settling”, FOCUS is looking to support resilience building programs aimed at empowering the Jamat to become self-reliant and contributing members of society. Activities targeted at accelerating the settlement process include:

• National language fluency - attaining a minimum of B2 (intermediate) level of national language knowledge.

• Economic upliftment – recognition of previous skills, recertification, career guidance, vocational training and access to the labour market.

• Access to ECD – raising awareness on ECD, signposting to local agencies and ensuring beneficiaries are enrolled.

• School support – ensuring children have access to tutors, are getting guidance on post-secondary enrolment and any learning difficulties are being addressed. 

• Mental health – addressing issues related to traumas of displacement, reducing the stigma, training to identify beneficiaries with mental health needs, signposting to local agencies and providing short-term and long-term support.

• Health and wellness – signposting to healthcare facilities, addressing any medical issues or addictions and ensuring beneficiaries are supported.

In the summer and autumn of 2020, FOCUS and its partner in Turkey, MSYD ASRA, provided support to over 900 households whose livelihoods have been disrupted by COVID-19.

Providing humanitarian aid and support in Turkey will continue to be a priority for FOCUS in the upcoming year ahead.

All AKAH country offices continue to focus on COVID-19 related services and support, such as providing medicine, food, basic hygiene kits and PPE to vulnerable communities. There are also continued efforts to train volunteers and health board workers on COVID-19 prevention measures (Pakistan) and to disinfect public places such as schools and government offices (Afghanistan).

Q3 2020 saw 108 disaster incidents (13 in Afghanistan, 31 in Pakistan, 45 in Syria and 19 in Tajikistan) affecting 41 villages, damaging 125 homes and either killing or injuring a total of 263 people. AKAH responded to 60 events (4 in Afghanistan, 11 in Pakistan, 45 in Syria), saving 6 lives in Pakistan. Non-food items were provided to 105 families affected by the flash flood in Afghanistan and 59 households in Pakistan were provided with tents and blankets from local stockpiles.

Last autumn also saw a total of 121 Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training sessions take place, training 2884 volunteers out of which 2114 (73%) were men and 770 (27%) were women. Additionally, 140 CERT members in Pakistan were trained specifically on COVID-19 support measures.

As part of AKAH’s COVID-19 response plan in Salamieh, in coordination with local committees in the Salamieh district, a “Hygiene Kits Distribution Campaign” was launched on 11th January 2021. The campaign is targeting 12,000 beneficiaries (8,046 in Salamieh and 3954 over eight villages).

The goal of this campaign is to assist the most vulnerable households and families to mitigate the health effects of COVID-19 and provide them with essential hygiene materials. This campaign has also required careful and strategic implementation as the area has been witnessing a significant increase in the number of cases since December 2020.

Meet Manal, a 35 year-old female volunteer at AKAH, who has been responsible for planning and executing the distribution of some of these hygiene kits. She says “A group of amazing women and I participated in the family hygiene kits distribution activity. We were keen to leave a good impact on our society and to be an example for the women of our society to be active and contribute to helping others and alleviating their suffering”.

In December 2020, FOCUS and the Ismaili Community in Portugal, jointly donated personal protective equipment (PPE) to the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority. 

The PPE donation included 25,000 surgical masks and 10,000 shields, which were distributed to Government institutions in the northern region of Portugal.

This donation was handed over to the Porto Emergency Operations Command, which belongs to the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority, who will be responsible for its management and distribution. 

The donation ceremony was made by the President of the Ismaili Community in Portugal, Rahim Firozali, to Lieutenant Colonel Carlos Alves, in the presence of the Honorable Secretary of State for Mobility, as coordinator for the Northern Region, Dr Eduardo Pinheiro and the Diplomatic Representative of the Ismaili Imamat, Commander Nazim Ahmad.

Supporting FOCUS’ work is easy! Select "Focus Humanitarian Assistance Europe" in AmazonSmile each time you shop and The AmazonSmile Foundation will donate 0.5% of eligible purchases to FOCUS Europe. For frequent Amazon users, this is a great way to support our projects!

If you don't see AmazonSmile in your settings, go to smile.amazon.co.uk. You will be asked to sign into your regular Amazon account and then prompted to pick a charity.

There is no cost to FOCUS or to customers - AmazonSmile offers all of the same items, prices and benefits as amazon.co.uk and 100% of the donation generated from eligible purchases will go to FOCUS Europe.

For those who use the Amazon app, you need to turn on AmazonSmile in your settings on the app. If you don’t see AmazonSmile in settings, once you’ve selected FOCUS Humanitarian Assistance Europe on the web via smile.amazon.co.uk, sign out of the app then back in again. Turning on AmazonSmile will then be an option in your settings.

Click here to find out more.

Thank you from the whole FOCUS Europe team in supporting this initiative!

While you are here...

To help FOCUS Europe in its efforts to save lives, reduce suffering and build resilience, we would be hugely grateful for any contributions towards these incredible projects.

The Ismaili Centre, 1 Cromwell Gardens, London, SW7 2SL
E-mail: focus@focus-europe.org
Registered Charity No. 1054174 | Company Registration No. FC019123