Bosnia, Srebrenica visit

WHA (www.webster-humanitarian-association.org) is an NGO created by students at Webster University in Geneva. I teach at Webster and was invited to come along on a trip to visit Srebrenica. The Srebrenica Genocide left more then 8500 people dead in July 1995. We went to visit several people who survived this dreadful period and experienced how people are dealing with living in this deeply divided community. 
Picture description:
1. A boy sitting in the shade (it was hot, around 40C) outside the "Trauma Center" in Sarajevo. 2.  Names of the dead at the Potocari Memorial Center outside Srebrenicia. 3. Hajra Catic has bought a small pasta factory that she hopes can generate an opportunity to some young people in Srebrenicia. Hopefully, they can get the funds necessary to start production. 4. Kiyoko, one of our students, in the gymnasium at the local primary school. 5. a local stray dog that I met several times...(!). The last three pictures shows residential houses with their various marks from the war and some of the surrounding burial sites. The last picture also shows the local orthodox church as well as the two mosque's.

Prisons..

Last week I went to Oslo and visited several prisons together with Keith Strandberg (www.keithstrandberg.com) who is a senior editor of Corrections Forum, a US prison magazine. It was a very interesting visit coordinated by the Norwegian justice Department. Amongst the prisons we visited were Halden Prison and Bastoy prison. Norway practises a philosophy of education in order to improve the chances of people not recommitting crimes, a philosophy that proves to work pretty well when reading the statistics..

Keith Strandberg talking to the Prison Director studying the plan of Halden Prison

High Security cell

Prisoner music studio

The wall

Vegetation is used to create a nice atmosphere

Prisoners can have family staying over for weekends. Particularly families living far away uses this possibility

The entrance of the prison

Bastoy prison is a farm like facility on an island in the Oslo fjord

The prison has got no walls and public access via a ferry

High court in Oslo