Together - the Blog of Together for Sudan

British Embassy Grant

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 19:40:00 +0000

Arecent grant from the British Embassy in Khartoum will allow us to train 35literacy teachers in the Khartoum area. The majority of these will be women,several of whom we hope will be able to set up literacy classes. It seems amiracle, given our present financial crisis, but four of our eight projects continueto function, including University Scholarships for Women, Vocational Training,Women’s Literacy classes and Eye Care Outreach. However, funding needs urgently to be replenished if we are to continueto support education for Sudanese women in both Sudan and South Sudan.

Small regular donations help us to plan ahead and are a really effective way of supporting our work.

Learn how to donate here

South Kordofan Update

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 11:40:00 +0000

Ourcolleague Saudi from the Together for Sudan office in Khartoum visited Kadugli in lateDecember and reports that he found Together for Sudan watchman Nazar still on duty despite thelooting of our office. No usable equipment remains in the building. Our two colleaguesvisited the landlord who promised to do general maintenance but all equipmentwill need to be replaced. Meanwhile, Kadugliremains tense and during Saudi’s visit to the local Commissioner, Together for Sudan was askedto move our upcoming Eye Care Outreach to Talodi – to which some 2,000 people fromother areas of South Kordofan have fled seeking safety in recent months. Thelocal Humanitarian Affairs Commission has lost most partners in UN agencies andinternational organizations. And it was not possible for Saudi to check on the morethan 20 solar lighting panels, most in unstable areas, which Together for Sudan had recentlyset up on schools and clinics.

See the Nuba section on our website

Eye Care News

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 05:16:00 +0000

News just in of two successful eye care outreaches in the suburbs of Khartoum and Omdurman last month. A total of 214 patients were seen; 139 were prescribed medicines, mainly eye drops; 51 were referred to hospital for sight tests; and 50 were recommended for operations. Many thanks to our indefatigable doctors who undertake this work and to Izdihar and colleagues from our Khartoum office who organize the day’s work and provide indispensable support.

We have just collated the eye care statistics for 2011. 5074 patients were seen, just over half of them at 24 day-long outreaches in the Khartoum displaced areas and the rest in the Nuba Mountains. 477 of the recommended operations were carried out, mostly for cataracts, and with an excellent success rate. The others will be arranged as soon as security conditions permit in the Nuba Mountains. We are glad to have been able to help so many people but the needs remain enormous and our generous donors - Dark and Light and Light for the World - have been obliged to suspend funding for us in 2012 because of the financial crisis. Can you help?

Our Eye Care Project web page

This team helped many in the Nuba Mountains early in 2011

News and Developments

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 21:56:00 +0000

Plans To Set Up Closer Ties with Ahfad University for Women.

TfS is currently in conversation with Ahfad University, our first partner, to strengthen the relationship by helping Ahfad improve the English language kills of first year students. President Gasim Badri, a TfS Patron, has made it a policy through the years to include southern and other displaced women, many of whom now remain at Ahfad, to complete their education. We salute Dr. Gasim for his far sighted and humanitarian approach to education as he follows in the footsteps of his grandfather who insisted on the need to educate girls and of his father who founded the school which eventually became Ahfad University for Women.

News from South Kordofan.

The Together for Sudan field office at Kadugli in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan has been closed since early June when widespread fighting broke out between Sudanese government forces and local militias. The area remains insecure and the TfS office closed although some of the looted furniture and equipment has been returned. Office guard Nazar keeps an eye on the situation but TfS Field Coordinator Ibrahim is unable for security reasons to return to Kadugli and now works in our Khartoum office. Sadly, a planed TfS Eye Care Outreach at Kadugli hospital later this year, using a team of eye specialists from
Khartoum, has been indefinitely postponed.

Eye Care Outreach in Women’s Prison, Omdurman.

During October Dr. Nabila Radi examined 113 women, 17 children and six men in the women’s prison in Omdurman. Appropriate medications as well as eye drops and vitamins were given to 88 people. Thirty seven women in need of corrective lenses were scheduled to be seen by a volunteer refractionist and prescriptions were sent to Together for Sudan to follow up. Three operations – two for bone malformation/obstruction and one for glaucoma – were scheduled. TfS Assistant Project Coordinator Izdihar reports that there are currently 180 children living with their mothers in the prison. The majority of the imprisoned women will have been arrested for brewing beer which is illegal but often the only way displaced and impoverished families can provide for their children. A second TfS Eye Care Outreach involving over 100 people was held by Dr. Shadia Alkhir Alshafia in Haj Yusuf outside Khartoum also in October.

Lillian

WHY SUDAN AND WHY EDUCATION OF WOMEN?

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 16:15:00 +0000

People often want to know how Together for Sudan began. The answer is that TfS was born in Sudan following a request for help from Sudanese women. But what, people ask next, is Together for Sudan accomplishing? And does it work?

These questions are on target and usually result in those of us who know Together for Sudan beginning to speak all at once. It’s true that working in Sudan can be difficult due to the enormous needs of the people, the size of the country, extreme climate and increasingly difficult travel regulations for foreigners. Then there are the many requests for medical, financial and other help which are beyond our mandate, to say nothing of our limited means.

From time to time bureaucracy, misunderstanding and delay have turned into the “Are we really getting anywhere?” feeling, especially when the work which our Sudanese colleagues are doing has been impeded. But that doesn’t last long when we remember what Together for Sudan has accomplished, how we have developed through the years and the opportunities which lie ahead. Finding ourselves now on the verge of starting work in South Sudan as well as continuing in the north, I shake my head and wonder at the audacity — and the privilege — of it all. Working with women to help other women is what TfS is about.

My response to the question “Why Sudan?” is that I was living in Khartoum in the mid 1990s, a time of great neglect of the Sudanese people by the international community, when a group of Muslim women invited me to set up peace dialogue between northern and southern women. About this same time a Christian mother in the Nuba Mountains asked me to put her daughter through university and I agreed to do so because several people, some of them unknown to me, had helped me through university. The work which is TfS grew from those small beginnings, changing many times along the way but always listening to what Sudanese women say they need most: education for themselves and their children. More broadly, what Sudanese women need most – and this is true in both Sudan and South Sudan – is a hand up rather than a hand-out. They can take it from there.

The first project in the work known today as Together for Sudan was University Scholarships for Women. Since then TfS has sent some 200 women through universities in Sudan and currently has 154 women at universities in Sudan and South Sudan. In the late 1990s a number of projects, including a mobile library, a listening service for suicidal and despairing people and a women’s centre, flowered and faded for various reasons.

At present TfS has eight projects, most urgently in need of funding. In addition to University Scholarships for Women, Women’s Literacy Classes, HIV/AIDS Awareness Outreach and Eye Care Outreach, there are also Vocational Training, Scholarships for HIV/AID Affected Children and Solar Lighting Panels for schools,clinics and community centers off the electricity grid. May I ask you to choose one of these projects – perhaps one related to help given to you at a time of need – and send us a cheque? There is joy in sharing!

Lillian Craig Harris

Dear Friends

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 12:48:00 +0000

In recent months there have been major developments in both Together for Sudan’s work and in Sudan
itself. We remain Muslims and Christians working together in service to the poor and dispossessed, women and children in particular. But Sudan’s recent transformation into the Republic of Sudan and the Republic of South Sudan presents us with both difficulties and opportunities. Thousands of southerners living in the north have returned to their home areas and our office in Khartoum has been hard hit. Former Deputy Country Coordinator Victor and former TfS Accountant Minallah are among the thousands of people now living in Juba, capital of South Sudan, many with no proper housing or employment. Meanwhile, a significant number of Together for Sudan university scholars have left the north and re-registered at Juba University, hoping that Together for Sudan can continue to support them.

Arriving in Khartoum in early October, TfS Secretary Alan Goulty and I knew —despite the present TfS funding deficit – that we must answer the question “Should we expand our work to South Sudan?” During a brief visit to Juba, we called on contacts at Juba University, the Episcopal church and various international and local organizations. It was not, however, until we visited a recently set up organization dealing with HIV/AIDS awareness that I realized how well prepared TfS is to work in South Sudan. Editha, former leader of our HIV/AIDS Awareness Outreach in the Khartoum area, is now in Juba and eager to be re employed by TfS – as are Victor and Minallah.

Together for Sudan’s roots go back to a small group of Muslim and Christian women who sought to bring understanding and peace between the two religions and, seeing the number of minarets as well as churches in Juba, I decided that TfS will be right at home there.

With your support we can continue our work in Khartoum and environs and also begin work in South Sudan. To start with, we hope to find funding for more university scholarships as well as for women’s literacy classes and HIV/AIDS outreach. And already the indefatigable Dr. Nabila Radi who heads the TfS Eye Care Outreach in the Khartoum area is talking about an outreach to the South Sudan city of Wau.
November 2011

Lillian Craig Harris

Fr Giovanni Vantini

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 17:15:00 +0000

All friends of Sudan mourn the passing of Father Giovanni Vantini, for nearly 60 years one of the leading scholars in the rich field of Sudanese studies. TfS Trustee, Herman Bell, has generously launched a fund in Father Vantini’s memory, to support the educational work of Together for Sudan. Contributions will be greatly appreciated. Donate on line here or go to our Donate page for other options.

Herman has also written the following tribute:

Father Giovanni Vantini was inspired by the extensive history of Christianity in the Sudan and spent most of his life serving the people of the Sudan. He is remembered with affection by his Muslim and Christian friends and students.

Father Vantini was born in Villafranca di Verona on 1 January 1923. He was ordained a priest in 1947, trained in Arabic and sent to the Sudan. There he spent 58 years, teaching in schools established by the Comboni missionaries, working in parish churches and St. Matthew’s Cathedral (Khartoum), engaging in journalistic endeavours such as Assalam [Peace], a bi-weekly journal launched at the time of independence in 1956, and conducting research on the history of the Church along the Nile for most of the past 2000 years. In 2005, he published La Missione del Cuore - I comboniani in Sudan nel ventesimo secolo [The Mission of the Heart – The Comboni Missionaries in Sudan in the Twentieth Century] (Bologna). In spite of ill health in his final years he managed to achieve the publication of Rediscovering Christian Nubia (Khartoum) in 2009. He died in Verona on the 3rd of May 2011 at the age of 87.

His command of Arabic was a vital skill for the production of his Oriental Sources Concerning Nubia (Heidelberg & Warsaw, 1975), an important companion study to the historical and archaeological work in which he was involved at that time in the Nile Valley. He wrote one of his major publications in Arabic: Ta' rikh al-masihiyya fi-l mamalik al-Nubiyya al-qadima wa-l- Sudan al-hadith [The History of Christianity in the Old Nubian Kingdoms and the Modern Sudan] (Khartoum, 1978).

In the colloquial Arabic of the Sudan there is a relevant expression of condolence which is widely used: al-baraka fiikum ‘Blessing upon you.’ Death reminds us of the great store of blessing that is available to us all. ‘Blessed be those who mourn for they shall be comforted.’

Saint Anna, mother of the Blessed VirginMary.
Faras Cathedral.

Father Vantini was admired as a scholar and a man of faith. He was also a kind and generous friend. Even though the Canticle of the Creatures was composed almost 700 years before his birth by Saint Francis, the following verses still seem particularly appropriate.

Altissimu, onnipotente bon Signore,
Tue so le laude la gloria e l'honore
et onne benedictione.
………
Laudato si', mi Signore, per sora nostra Morte corporale,
da la quale nullu homo vivente po skappare,
………
Laudate et benedicete mi Signore et rengratiate
et serviteli cun grande humilitate.

Good Lord, most high and almighty,
To thee be praises, glory, honour and all blessings.
………
Be praised, my Lord, for our sister bodily death
From whom no human being can escape.
………
Praise and bless my Lord; thank Him,
And serve Him with great humility.

By Herman Bell - TfS Trustee.

Together for Sudan visits Omdurman Women’s prison.

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 21:38:00 +0000

On 20 October the TFS eye care team led by Dr Nabila Radi visited Omdurman Women’s prison and saw 113 patients, of whom 90 were women and 17 children. There are reportedly 180 children in all staying with their mothers in the prison. Medicines were provided for 88 patients and arrangements made for 37 women to have their sight tested by a volunteer refractionist so that corrective lenses can be supplied by TFS. It is worth noting that 50 of the women seen on this visit were studying in literacy classes in the prison. So it is all the more important that they see well enough to read.

Three patients were also referred for operations, which will be carried out at the police hospital as the women are not allowed to leave custody to have the operations done elsewhere.

Alan Goulty

Kadugli Office Update

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 14:31:00 +0000

Itis a great sadness that the TfS office in Kadugli, South Kordofan, has beenclosed since fighting swept across the area in early June. None of our colleagues were injured but amongitems looted from our Kadugli office was a very expensive microscope essentialfor eye surgery during Eye Care Outreach. We remain hopeful that the microscopewill be returned and that – workingthrough the Kadugli office – we may be able to continue Eye Care Outreach inthe Kadugli hospital. We hope that a colleague from our Khartoum office will beable to visit Kadugli soon. Meanwhile, ourloyal guard, who was sent away by soldiers before the looting, is back in theoffice for which we had paid rent for several months in advance. However, our TfS Field Representative is nowworking in the Khartoum office. Alan andI were denied permission to go to Kadugli on our recent trip.

Lillian Craig Harris - TfS Director

Together for Sudan in the Nuba Mountains - click here to learn more

A group of trainees outside the TfS Kadugli office and project centre

Lambeth Palace Event Thanks

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 13:48:00 +0000

The Sudanese Ambassador attended

TheTfS fundraising event at London’s Lambeth Palace was a major success – and alsogreat fun. Lady Patey and Dr. Christine Green arranged the event with excellentsupport from Lambeth Palace. Over 8,000sterling was raised, some 4,600 during the auction of promises. The BarbershopQuartet, which has sung for us on several occasions, was another highlights ofthe event and I avoided creating a third highlight by not falling off theladder which I climbed to give a short speech. Together for Sudan is enormously grateful to Lambeth Palace personnelfor their assistance and hospitality. TfS Patron Archbishop Rowan Williams wasin Africa and thus unable to attend the event.

Lillian's comments at the event

Read the report on our website

A Trip to Juba

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 20:34:00 +0000

During an early October visit to Sudan Alan and I make a quick trip to Juba, now thecapital of South Sudan. Two of oursubstantive staff from Khartoum, including Deputy Country Coordinator Victor, had moved to Juba and we hoped tocheck out how feasible it might be to expand TfS work to South Sudan. We wereimpressed by the vitality of the new state and the need for literacy trainingfor women, HIV/AIDS Awareness outreach and other work which would fit our projects. Although TfS has at present no funding tobegin working in Juba we would welcome all donations to do so!

Lillian Craig Harris

Donate to our work online here

Go to our Donate web page to see other options

Lambeth Palace Comments

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 21:10:00 +0000

Lillian Craig Harris, director of Together for Sudan spoke at our recent charity auction in Lambeth palace London. Her comments are replicated below.

11 October 2011

Lillian speaking at the event

Good evening and thank you for joiningTogether for Sudan for this fundraising event which is also a celebration ofour service to the Sudanese people. I amgrateful to Together for Sudan Patron Archbishop Rowan Williams and his stafffor inviting us here this evening even though the Archbishop is currently inAfrica.

Many thanks are due as well to Dr. ChristineGreen and to Lady Patey for the many hours they have spent organizing thisevent. And, of course, special thanks toPeter Arbuthnot, our auctioneer, and to member of the Barbershop Quartet whohave sung for us on several occasions. Iam also grateful to fellow Together for Sudan Trustees Norman Swanney andAdrian Thomas as well as to Dave Lewis, the Together for Sudan webmaster, whopublicised this event. And, of course, my great appreciation to all our helpersand supporters, especially you who are here this evening.

Together for Sudan has been a blessed charitysince it began in the late 1990s. Oureducational and health care projects remain in great demand in the Khartoumarea and in South Kordofan where we have a second office in Kadugli. However, the charity presently faces severefinancial difficulties as well as disruption of our work due to violence inSouth Kordofan. Our Kadugli office has been closed since early June due tofighting and subsequent looting of our office there. We also face the challenge of recent loss ofsouthern colleagues who have left Khartoum for South Sudan with the birth ofthat new nation.

Alan and I arrived in the UK yesterday aftervisits to both Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, and Juba, the capital of the newnation of South Sudan. We are invited tobegin work in South Sudan and even have there two former colleagues from ourKhartoum office who would gladly work for us in Juba. The needs and opportunities are enormous andwe lack only the necessary funding. Today many people are reaching out to helpSouth Sudan but relatively few are engaged directly with the criticallyimportant education of women and children.

Sudan’s present circumstances are thegreatest challenge which Together for Sudan has faced in our more than 15 yearsof service to the Sudanese people. From the beginning – and at the request ofSudanese women – the work which became Together for Sudan has brought Muslimsand Christians together in service to the poor. We hope to continue this work because it is a peace building gift whichMuslims and Christians can give to one another. Our basic intent is to crosstribal, religious and social barriers in order to make peace by demonstratingthat people of different faiths and backgrounds can work together to help otherpeople in need.

This is who we are and what we believe.

In our present circumstances of combinedperil and opportunity, I am reminded of my mother who was a missionary nurseand loved people of all sorts, mothers and babies in particular. Mom taught me to look on, rather than lookaway from, the suffering of others. Whenthere were difficult times and seemingly insurmountable obstacles she wouldsay, “Sometimes you just have to do it!” And then she would get busy helping.

So what would she do if she were heretoday? I think that she would reach outto desperate Sudanese women who long for education for themselves and theirchildren. Several years ago when I askeddisplaced women in Darfur what they needed they cried out “Teach us to read andwe will help ourselves!” With thatmandate, Together for Sudan carries on although several of our projects arecurrently unfunded and the future is not clear.

Thank you for joining us at this criticallyimportant time for all Sudanese people. It remains extremely important that we as individuals ask ourselves “AmI my sister’s keeper?” And that werespond positively. Thank you all forbeing with us tonight. Enjoy!

LILLIAN CRAIG HARRIS,Director .

Read about the event on our website here

A Story on Vocational Training Scholars

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 10:49:00 +0000

Displaced families face a daily struggle to survive on the outskirts of Khartoum, where there is lack of running water, electricity, or healthcare. In spite of these harsh conditions, young people in these areas are determined to gain qualifications and lift themselves out of poverty. We felt this determination while we were supervising them during their year of study and it was obvious in their results where all our 21 vocational scholars passed the exam with very good grades. We have sixteen scholars in Alfiha centre, two in Vocational Training Centre No (1), and three in St. Joseph Centre.

Vocational Scholars learn while tackling a practical challenge.

The majority of our scholars (fourteen students) study Electricity, five study Mechanics and one each auto electricity, and refrigeration and air-conditioning. It is worth mentioning that even our two scholars who couldn’t attend the exam because of medical problems, sat the exam later and gained good results. Their success shows that people whose lives were devastated by war in Darfur, the Nuba Mountains, and South Sudan are hungry to learn and they just need guidance, support, and care to achieve their dreams. Thanks to the Gordon Memorial College Trust Fund for financing this project!

The TfS Vocational Scholarship Project

Eye Care Results

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 10:33:00 +0000

This lady has Pterygium

Our eye care team led by the indefatigable Dr Nabila Radi continued their excellent work for the displaced around Khartoum in September. At outreaches in squatter areas north of Omdurman on 11 September and south of Khartoum on the 29th, she saw 232 patients, 141 of them women and 7 children. In the second outreach there were an unusually large number of advanced cases of glaucoma, sadly diagnosed as beyond effective treatment. The patients concerned were given drops as a palliative. In all 118 patients received medicines, 20 were referred for operations, 48 received glasses and 76 will have further tests to determine the lenses they need. Thanks to Dr Nabila for all she does to help.

Sadly this boy's eye must be removed

But there is no sign of the demand for these services diminishing. How much more could be done if we only had more resources!

The TfS Eye Care Project

Please donate to our work even small donations add up !

Khartoum Changes

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 10:11:00 +0000

One of the challenges facing a small charity is to keep down the inescapable overhead costs. Our Khartoum team have just made a useful contribution through finding a new office, smaller than the previous one but adequate, in better condition and at a lower rent. It is in the same area of the city known as Khartoum 3. Here is a snap of the outside and one of Rasha in her office interviewing one of the TfS university scholars.

Sadly Rasha is leaving us at the end of September to return to England. We shall miss her great contribution especially to the drafting of project reports and of notes for this site. We wish her well in whatever she decides to do next.

News from Kadugli

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 22:00:00 +0000

The news from Kadugli in the Nuba Mountains is less good. The TFS office there remains closed, its work is suspended and there is no news of the stolen operating microscope and solar panels. And we have just heard that the Sudanese authorities have turned down a request from the Director to visit Kadugli because of continuing insecurity in the town.

News from Khartoum

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 21:59:00 +0000

Good news from Khartoum is in short supply these days. But we were cheered by the success of our last two eye care outreaches in the Khartoum displaced areas just before the Eid. A total of 265 patients were seen by our doctor and 43 referred to hospitals for operations, to be performed this month. Thanks to Dark and Light, our generous sponsors for this project.

Letters of thanks

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 21:52:00 +0000

Some of the Together for Sudan University Graduates have recently written letters of appreciation and thanks for the support that they received in gaining and passing their University courses. They are all very grateful for the opportunity of making a difference to Sudan and improving the lives of those around them. See their words on our website.

Furniture Found

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 21:43:00 +0000

Better news from Kadugli in that some of the furniture looted from the TFS office on 21 June has been returned, thanks primarily to good local police work. But the eye care microscope and solar panels are still missing. However the situation in the town is still too insecure to permit the office to resume work. Let us pray that the holy month of Ramadan, which is about to begin, will ease the tensions there.

All in the day’s work for Dr Nabila

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 21:39:00 +0000

We have just received reports on two eye care outreaches held earlier this month, in a poor suburb of Omdurman and the North Khartoum district of Haj Yousif. In all 229 patients were seen, 17 operations recommended, 30 pairs of glasses distributed and over 100 patients received eye drops or other medicines. All in the day’s work for Dr Nabila but what a busy two days!

A start to fundraising in the USA.

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 19:31:00 +0000

With pending, and now achieved, federal permission to fundraise in the United States, Friends Together for Sudan has made a giant step forward. Already Alan and I have lectured about Sudan and the work of Together for Sudan at Malloy College in New York and St. John’s Episcopal Church in Mclean, Virginia. And Alan did a splendid job informing American Friends of the Episcopal Church in Sudan about Sudanese history and present difficulties facing the Sudanese people. It took two years for Friends Together for Sudan to gain official approval to introduce itself in the US, but now here we are all dressed up and looking for more opportunities to spread the word.
Give us a call at this address or email us at lilliancharris@gmail.co, or afglch@verizon.net.

TfS Colleagues Go South

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 16:41:00 +0000

Together for Sudan’s friends and trustees join TfS field workers in mourning the loss of three colleagues who have decided to leave for South Sudan as a result of the 9 July division of Sudan into two countries. Deputy Country Coordinator Victor has already left for Juba and accountant Minalla and Messenger/cleaner Rina plan to leave as soon as transportation is available. Our sadness at the loss of these valued friends and co-workers is overwhelming. I ask the one God of Christians and Muslims to comfort, guide and protect all our Sudanese coworkers and supporters at this time of enormous change and uncertainty.

TfS Kadugli Office Looted

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 16:37:00 +0000

Under pretext of an imminent air raid, TfS office guard Nazar was warned by soldiers to leave the Kadugli office. When he returned some time later he found the office stripped of computers, furniture, safe, files and all other moveable equipment. Most other NGO and INGO offices had already been looted. We are enormously grateful to Nazar for staying at his post as long as possible despite the threatening situation.

The Nuba People return to war

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 16:34:00 +0000

Together for Sudan’s office in Kadugli has been closed since early June following an outbreak of heavy fighting in South Kordofan between government forces and the Nuba peole. TfS Field Coordinator Ibrahim was evacuated by UNIMIS with other INGO Forum personnel and subsequently reunited with his family in Wad Medani. He will work from our Khartoum office for the time being. Kawther, a TfS university graduate, who was volunteering in the Kadugli office and Fatima, our cleaner/messenger have also reached safe haven. Fighting continues

Going Mobile - Text a Donation

noreply@blogger.com (Dave) — Tue, 10 May 2011 10:49:00 +0000

From today you will be able to text a donation to Together for Sudan using your mobile phone. This great little innovation makes donating easier than ever before. We receive the whole amount of your donation and if eligible we can also receive Gift Aid from your donation.

Small amounts or large amount don't matter, please give what you can afford. The process is simple:

Use any mobile phone
Send a text to 70070
Text this message with the amount you want to give - i.e. - TFSA01 £10
Set the value to what you want to give
Agree to Gift Aid if applicable

It's that easy. Please make a donation to our work and help us do more in Sudan.