The Australian Civilian Corps (ACC) is an Australian Government sub-agency that recruits and deploys civilian specialists to provide aid to developing nations in times of conflict or natural disasters. [1] It is a component of AusAID (the Australian Agency for International Development) that was created in 2009 [2] and operates to increase the effectiveness of Australia's overseas aid program by providing rapid response capabilities.
The ACC maintains a register of up to 500 civilians who have offered their particular skills and experience in a wide range of roles. These registered civilians can be engaged for rapid deployment to natural disaster zones and regions experiencing conflict to assist and coordinate disaster recovery efforts, [3] where an official request for assistance has been received from the affected nation.
The ACC has sent deployments to South Sudan, Haiti and Afghanistan, supporting recovery and stabilisation programs. [4] An ACC worker was seriously injured in a suicide attack in the Uruzgan province of Afghanistan in March 2012. [5]
Civil defense or civil protection is an effort to protect the citizens of a state from human-made and natural disasters. It uses the principles of emergency operations: prevention, mitigation, preparation, response, or emergency evacuation and recovery. Programs of this sort were initially discussed at least as early as the 1920s and were implemented in some countries during the 1930s as the threat of war and aerial bombardment grew. Civil-defense structures became widespread after authorities recognised the threats posed by nuclear weapons.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance of 31 member states – 29 European and two North American. Established in the aftermath of World War II, the organization implemented the North Atlantic Treaty, signed in Washington, D.C., on 4 April 1949. NATO is a collective security system: its independent member states agree to defend each other against attacks by third parties. During the Cold War, NATO operated as a check on the threat posed by the Soviet Union. The alliance remained in place after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact and has been involved in military operations in the Balkans, the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa. The organization's motto is animus in consulendo liber.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS), initially created under President Jimmy Carter by Presidential Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1978 and implemented by two Executive Orders on April 1, 1979. The agency's primary purpose is to coordinate the response to a disaster that has occurred in the United States and that overwhelms the resources of local and state authorities. The governor of the state in which the disaster occurs must declare a state of emergency and formally request from the President that FEMA and the federal government respond to the disaster. The only exception to the state's gubernatorial declaration requirement occurs when an emergency or disaster takes place on federal property or to a federal asset—for example, the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, or the Space Shuttle Columbia in the 2003 return-flight disaster.
A civilian is a person not a member of an armed force nor a person engaged in hostilities.
The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) was a multinational military mission in Afghanistan from 2001 to 2014. It was established by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1386 pursuant to the Bonn Agreement, which outlined the establishment of a permanent Afghan government following the U.S. invasion in October 2001. ISAF's primary goal was to train the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) and assist Afghanistan in rebuilding key government institutions; it gradually took part in the broader war in Afghanistan against the Taliban insurgency.
A Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) was a unit introduced by the United States government, consisting of military officers, diplomats, and reconstruction subject matter experts, working to support reconstruction efforts in unstable states. PRTs were first established in Afghanistan in early 2002, and were used in Iraq as well. While the concepts are similar, PRTs in Afghanistan and Iraq had separate compositions and missions. Their common purpose, however, was to empower local governments to govern their constituents more effectively.
Uruzgan, also spelled as Urozgan or Oruzgan, is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan. Uruzgan is located in the center of the country. The population is 436,079, and the province is mostly a tribal society. Tarinkot serves as the capital of the province.
Throughout the War in Afghanistan, there had been 3,606 coalition deaths in Afghanistan as part of the coalition operations since the invasion in 2001. In this total, the American figure is for deaths "In and Around Afghanistan" which, as defined by the United States Department of Defense, includes some deaths in Pakistan and Uzbekistan and the deaths of 18 CIA operatives.
The Danish Emergency Management Agency (DEMA) is a Danish governmental agency under the Ministry of Defence. Its principal task is to manage an operational part who work out of six Emergency Management Centres, and administrative and legalizing part, who supervises the national and municipal rescue preparedness and advises the authorities on matters of preparedness. DEMA works in closely structured co-operation with the EU, UN and several neighbouring countries.
During the War in Afghanistan, according to the Costs of War Project the war killed 176,000 people in Afghanistan: 46,319 civilians, 69,095 military and police and at least 52,893 opposition fighters. However, the death toll is possibly higher due to unaccounted deaths by "disease, loss of access to food, water, infrastructure, and/or other indirect consequences of the war." According to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program, the conflict killed 212,191 people. The Cost of War project estimated in 2015 that the number who have died through indirect causes related to the war may be as high as 360,000 additional people based on a ratio of indirect to direct deaths in contemporary conflicts.
The following lists events that happened during 2004 in Afghanistan.
US and NATO International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) operations, alongside Afghan National Army forces, continued against the Taliban through 2007.
MERCY Malaysia or Malaysian Medical Relief Society is a non-profit organisation focusing on providing medical relief, sustainable health related development and risk reduction activities for vulnerable communities in both crisis and non-crisis situations. As a non-profit organisation, MERCY Malaysia relies solely on funding and donations from organisations and generous individuals to continue their services to provide humanitarian assistance to beneficiaries, both in Malaysia and internationally. The organisation is a registered society according to the Societies Act 1966 in Malaysia, and the headquarters is in the capital city of Kuala Lumpur.
The Civilian Response Corps is a program of the United States Department of State, Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization (S/CRS). The Civilian Response Corps is a group of federal employees and volunteers from the private sector, state and local governments who are trained to deploy rapidly in countries that are in crisis or emerging from conflict in order to provide reconstruction and stabilization assistance.
The Azizabad airstrike was carried out by the United States Air Force on Friday 22 August 2008 in the village of Azizabad which is located in Shindand district, Herat Province, Afghanistan. The airstrike killed an estimated 33 to 92 civilians, mostly children, and a number of structures in the village including homes were damaged or destroyed, although there remains some dispute about the accuracy of these figures. A Taliban commander was the intended target of the airstrike.
United States and NATO International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) operations, alongside Afghan National Army forces, continued against the Taliban through 2008.
RedR is an international NGO whose stated mission is to “rebuild lives in times of disaster by training, supporting, and providing aid workers to relief programmes across the world.” It was originally an acronym for Register of Engineers for Disaster Relief, although it is no longer used as such.
Ahmad Omaid Khpalwak, also spelled as Ahmed Omed Khpulwak, was an Afghan journalist who worked for the Pajhwok Afghan News and as a freelance stringer for the BBC since 2008. After an investigation into his death, it was determined by the International Security Assistance Force that an American soldier had accidentally killed Khpalwak while clearing a broadcast building of terrorists while Tarin Kowt was under attack. Khpalwak was the third journalist from Pajhwok to be killed in three years. He was the third BBC reporter to be killed in Afghanistan and the second BBC reporter to be killed in the War in Afghanistan.
Lieutenant Colonel Garth Callender is the author of After the Blast: An Australian Officer in Iraq and Afghanistan, published by Black Inc. in 2015.
The 20-year-long War in Afghanistan had a number of significant impacts on Afghan society.