SOCIAL GOOD
The Diplomatic Council has determined that donations collected from its members and sponsors are to be used in particular for the protection and education of children and adolescents all over the world. It has therefore established a worldwide program offering its members to take over educational sponsorships, in particular for orphans. The members’ donations will be used exclusively to finance a vocational training or a study of a child or adolescent which cannot afford education without external assistance. Two children of “The Little Smile” orphanage have received funding for their studies from their Diplomatic Council godparents Dr. Thomas Durchlaub and Annette Habermann. Under the umbrella of the Diplomatic Council Education Sponsorship program, Xuan Tinh Herfort, Diplomatic Council Director for ASEAN and CEO of Indochinatravels, has awarded 10 scholarships to particularly talented pupils of the “Thi tran Van Dien school” in the south of Hanoi (Vietnam), preferably girls from poor families. The Diplomatic Council’s objective is to expand this program in the upcoming years finding more and more godparents for under-privileged children.
The Diplomatic Council not only raises funds and makes donations but it also employs high-visibility measures and actions to draw attention to important topics and projects and helps them expand.
White IT is one of the best examples. More than five years ago the Diplomatic Council joined the White IT Alliance, which is now a unique global alliance of over 80 different actors from politics, industry, law enforcement authorities, trade unions, associations, victim protection authorities, science and public administration with one goal: to fight child abuse. Thanks to its UN consultative status, the Diplomatic Council made it possible for White IT to present its initiative at the United Nations including the Geneva Peace Week and the UN Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice.
The main objective of White IT is to dry out the market for child pornography which in these days mainly is the Internet or rather the dark net. Diplomatic Council members support this initiative in bringing in their technology expertise as well as the technology products such as a new compliance scanner that was introduced at UN side event. This newly created software would be installed in corporate and public networks in order to detect and block illegal contents. The software helps detecting child pornographic material (pictures, videos) that is stored on corporate and public networks. The necessary comparable data is provided by the US American National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Once the scanner identifies illegal data – in this case a picture of a child reported missing – in a corporate or public network, it will trigger an alarm. The compliance scanner is particularly intended for large administrations and companies which face severe problems in detecting illegal contents infiltrated by their own employees or externals due to the increasing complexity of their information systems. The Diplomatic Council as well as White IT are seeking further partners to provide comparable data for combating other crimes such as terrorism or money laundering.
The non-profit Neven Subotic Foundation of the Serbian football player Neven Subotić, a Diplomatic Council member playing for the national teams in US, Serbia and Germany, has received the largest single donation made by the Diplomatic Council. The Neven Subotić Foundation’s objective is to help children in the poorest regions in the world to gain access to clean water and sanitation and improve the hygiene situation for them with the result that more children can attend school again since they are no longer kept away from school due to sickness.
Neven Subotić is an exceptional football player, both with regards to his playing skills and his social commitment. Subotić was born in today’s Bosnia Herzegovina. Together with his parents, he came to Germany in 1990 but they immigrated to the USA in 1999 in order to avoid deportation to Bosnia Herzegovina. In his career, he played for US, Serbian and German national teams and recorded many successes. Neven Subotić acts as an ambassador of the children’s association “Children’s Laughter”. In 2013 he established the Neven Subotić Foundation which supports projects for children in need, in particular well construction projects in Africa. 663 Million people do no have access to clean water while 5.000 children die every day due to contaminated water. On July 28, 2010 the United Nations declared the right to water and sanitation a human right. Clean water, sanitation and hygiene form the three fundamental pillars for a sustainable future. Without them, there is no dignified life.
The Neven Subotić Foundation supports numerous WASH projects in the Tigray region in North Ethiopia which, beyond the humanitarian aspects, create investments in this poor region and helps the local people. Clean water is the source of life, however, 663 Million people still have not access. Between 1990 and 2010 1,8 billion people have received access to sanitation, however 2,5 billion people worldwide still have to do without (UN Water 2013) with the terrible result that every 20 seconds a child is dying because of contaminated water. More children die of contaminated water than of Malaria, Measles and Aids together. Every ninth person in the world has no access to clean drinking water and every third person has no access to sanitation facilities (UN Water 2013). Around 3,5 Million die each year due to a lack of water supply and access to sanitation. Access to sanitation, hygiene products and drinking water may save the lives of 1,5 Million children each year (UN Water 2013). This is why the Diplomatic Council supports the Neven Subotic Foundation – in order to help these children to gain their right and to live a dignified life.
The Diplomatic Council Healthcare Forum which certifies hospitals all around the world is aware of the quality criteria for medical treatments. For the purpose of sharing this knowledge with those countries that are in need of medical infrastructure, workshops are organised for the respective ambassadors. A country looking to attract more tourists and investors needs to establish a good medical infrastructure both for the benefit of its own residents but also for travellers from abroad. Having awarded the “Diplomatic Council Preferred Partner Hospitals”, the Diplomatic Council Preferred Partner Clinics” and the “Medical Travel Coordinator” seals to more than 60 medical facilities worldwide, the Diplomatic Council has created a directory that embassies can obtain on requests to recommend the right medical facilities to their expatriates.
“Zero Mothers Die” is a UNAIDS assisted project and one of the projects that has received a donation at a Diplomatic Council gala winter gala. The Diplomatic Council has furthermore run information campaigns to promote Zero Mothers Die at several events, on its website, through newsletters and by means of press releases. This marketing support is extremely helpful for projects looking for funding.
Zero Mothers Die is a global partnership initiative to save the lives of pregnant women and their newborns by disseminating mobile technologies to increase access to pregnancy information and emergency care.
On a regular basis, the Diplomatic Council receives donations from its members who also make recommendations on the projects to be supported. Tareto Maa is one of the projects suggested by a member who is involved with the project. Tareto Maa fights against female genital mutilation and forced child marriages in Kenya. It is a grass-roots project, in the best sense of the word: founded by members of the local community and working for change within the community. The relief project is seated in Kilgoris (Rift Valley, Kenya). We run information campaigns on child health and child rights and aim to overcome the outdated traditions of female genital mutilation and forced marriages within the Maasai community. It is our committed belief that children have a right to education, to a healthy life, and to a safe environment.