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KOSOVO - Official U.S. Government Documents For more information regarding the latest policy statements and other materials related to the Kosovo crisis, visit http://www.usia.gov/regional/eur/balkans/kosovo/
***********************************************************Kosovo Refugee Internet Assistance Plan Begins New Phase
(Nancy Ozeas of USIA Outlines Next Steps)
By Michelle Johns
USIA Staff WriterWashington -- The U.S. Information Agency's (USIA's) Kosovo Internet Assistance Initiative -- a public-private partnership that uses information technology to help address the information and humanitarian needs of Kosovar refugees -- has entered an exciting, new phase.
Nancy Ozeas, USIA's Information Bureau Chief of Staff, recently returned from a trip to the Balkans where she worked with IOM (International Organization for Migration) and OTI (Office of Transition Initiatives, U.S. Agency for International Development) partners to plan for the establishment of seven Internet Information Centers throughout Kosovo. The new centers will provide local communities with Internet access and create a regional network of programs that will promote sustainable information infrastructures, develop a long-term information and technology knowledge base, and strengthen civil society.
In a recent interview, Ozeas, discussed the scope of phase two of the USIA initiative that was first launched in May.
"Now that the refugees' return home is almost complete," Ozeas said, "it has become necessary to switch gears from disseminating information -- including Albanian language news reports, via Internet centers in Kosovo Albanian refugee camps around the world -- to establishing a network of Internet centers in Kosovo that will continue to provide information to the refugees as they begin to rebuild their homes and communities."
It is now time to prepare for the next phase of the Internet Assistance Initiative, which is to focus "resources and efforts in Kosovo," she added.
In July Ozeas and representatives of USAID and IOM, an international non-governmental organization, took the first step toward making those Internet centers in Kosovo a reality. They toured prospective sites for the centers that will be established in six cities -- Pristina, Pec, Urosevac (Ferizaj in Albanian), Prizren, Dakovica, and Gnjilane -- to evaluate available physical space, to consider how requirements for electricity and other needs could be met, and to consult with community leaders and members of local groups that could benefit from the centers. Mitrovica is under consideration as a location for a seventh Internet center, but final plans are pending because of the unstable situation there.
The Kosovo Refugee Internet Assistance Initiative began as a one-time response to a specific humanitarian crisis, but has evolved into something with far greater implications and longer term applications. The public-private partnership is the realization of a plan conceived of and implemented by USIA's Information Bureau Director Jonathan Spalter, who calls the Internet "a sharp new tool in the diplomatic arsenal."
The initiative has brought together government agencies, information technology companies, and international relief organizations in a coordinated effort to utilize technology and the Internet to meet Kosovar refugees' urgent information, humanitarian, and communication needs. Some of the entities participating in the project are USAID, the Department of State, National Security Council, Apple Computer, Inc., Hewlett Packard, Xerox, International Data Group, the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner on Refugees, and the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Through Internet information sites established in refugee camps in France, Germany, Poland, the United States (Fort Dix, New Jersey), the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Albania, as well as USIA's Albanian language newsletter "Kontakti," the initiative has been able to provide real-time Albanian language news, offer access to refugee registers to locate lost family members and other loved ones, facilitate coordination of non-governmental relief agencies on the ground, and offer a means of communication among the refugee camps.
Aided by more than 1.5 million dollars in donations, this partnership -- combining the money, resources, and technology of the private sector with the access and initiative of the public sector -- has succeeded in mobilizing the tools of the information age to help alleviate Kosovo's refugee crisis. Using technology that did not exist ten years ago, the initiative demonstrates an achievement that neither the public nor private sector could have accomplished on its own without the aid of the other. It also reflects an evolution in the nature of strategies for humanitarian crisis relief/response, diplomacy, and the rebuilding of civil society.
"Technology is changing the way we respond to international events," Ozeas said. "Tools such as the Internet provide us with new opportunities to respond to situations such as the humanitarian crisis in Kosovo."
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