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Programmes and Operations
Present Programmes |
Timor-Leste / East Timor
Survivors of Torture Program
Additional information
Contact:
Viet Nguyen-Gillham
Program Manager
ICMC East Timor, with the support of funds from the U.S. Agency
for International Development (USAID), began this program in September
2002.
Torture is a personal and social experience. In East Timor (now
known as Timor Leste), individuals, families and communities are
survivors, if not witnesses of violent acts during the time of
Indonesian rule.
Today, the people of Timor Leste grapple at the interpersonal,
family and community levels with the trauma of their violent past,
amidst issues of peace and reconciliation. The people also need
to come to terms with the socio-economic and political uncertainties
of their new nation.
In these early days following the birth of Timor Lester as an
independent state, the urgency for support to survivors of torture
and trauma cannot be overstated in the ongoing processes of peace
and reconciliation, return and reintegration, and nation building.
Program Strategy
Many women were tortured during Timor Leste's recent violent
past. ICMC works with local organizations to help survivors of
torture rebuild their lives.
ICMC's Survivors of Torture program builds upon existing programs
in Timor Leste in order to help reduce the devastating effects
of torture upon individuals, their families and their communities.
This is being facilitated through four program activities:
Each organization participates in an intensive, individualized
needs assessment in partnership with ICMC to determine an organization's
strengths and areas of concern. ICMC's experience in Timor Leste
shows that by beginning in this way, both parties are better
able to define what they are able and would like to achieve
during the lifetime of the program. Based on the results of
the needs assessment, ICMC and local partners develop a strategic
plan for achieving the organizational and programming skills
necessary for a sustainable, professional program.
- Technical Assistance
Due to their limited exposure to other Survivors of Torture
programs and experts, the organizations with which ICMC works
have requested support to improve their technical ability to
identify, interview, assess and provide quality services to
survivors of torture. ICMC provides experienced professionals
to address these requests, specifically in the areas of interviewing
techniques, basic/advanced counseling skills, trauma identification/recovery,
physical health concerns for survivors of torture, documentation
of abuses, legal assistance, and security precautions, as well
as other identified topics.
- Networking
Although very few Indonesian NGOs have the sole mandate
to work with survivors of torture, many have this population
as one of their primary target groups. ICMC has gathered relevant
organizations - both those that are ICMC partners and those
that are not - to discuss common concerns and successful programming
interventions.
ICMC believes that a network enables partners to collaborate
in empowering ways that allows them to be more effective in
the fight against torture by responding rapidly to developing
situations and answering the needs of victims.
ICMC is also committed to involving the Timor Leste organizations
in the worldwide Victims of Torture networks (although ICMC
recognizes the internationally used term "victims of torture",
for our programming purposes we use "survivors of torture").
This is done through the dissemination of relevant information
and the use of technical experts from other organizations for
the training programs mentioned above.
- Financial Assistance
The already limited resources of our local partner organizations
are being quickly depleted due to the increase in reported survivors
of torture. Their financial situation frequently prevents NGOs
from providing care for the new - and newly encountered - survivors.
To counter this, ICMC runs a grants management program for organizations
that address the needs of survivors. Organizations that demonstrate
an interest in increasing their professional capacity and commit
themselves to addressing the needs of survivors of torture in
unbiased ways and by nonpolitical means are eligible for program
grants. Potential programs may include community awareness/information
campaigns and publications (posters, pamphlets, etc), programs
that target the needs of children and youth as indirect survivors
of torture, women's support/empowerment groups, legal aid services,
medical support, government advocacy, etc.
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