SAMANTHA POWER'S REMARKS ON CAREER OF MARTEN GRUNDITZ

FROM:  THE STATE DEPARTMENT 
Samantha Power
U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations 
New York, NY
February 2, 2015
AS DELIVERED

Marten Grunditz’s career as a diplomat spanned more than four decades. He was first posted as an attaché to the Swedish Mission in Moscow in 1973, when it was still part of the Soviet Union. He went on to serve in Beijing, Washington, London, Geneva, Athens, and, of course, here in New York. He was a dexterous and deep diplomat.

Here at the UN, Ambassador Grunditz led the joint Executive Board of UNDP, UNFPA and UNOPS, where he pressed for far-reaching reforms, such as the public disclosure of internal audits. He also chaired the Liberia Configuration of the Peacebuilding Commission, sounding the alarm bell early and ardently for the international community to respond to the spreading Ebola outbreak. He was also determined to ensure that Liberia and its neighbors were built back better – so what has befallen the people of that region never happens again.

Among the first impressions many of us had upon meeting Marten was his sheer physical presence. He towered above virtually all of us. But the Ambassador’s personality and the way he treated people had the opposite effect: it made him accessible; it brought him close. And this was not only the case for fellow ambassadors, but for everyone he interacted with – from the most junior intern to the most senior advisor, as well as to people of all walks and ranks at UN agencies and other missions.

A ranking diplomat on his staff who worked with Ambassador Grunditz for years observed that – when he chaired meetings during his time at the head of the joint Executive Board – he always made a point of thanking every secretary and member of the support staff who had helped organize the event. As this diplomat described it, Marten Grunditz had, “an ability to recognize people.” An ability to recognize people.

Ambassador Grunditz also knew how to listen. In diplomatic settings that can too often feel automated, he would actually stop and pay attention to people’s opinions and arguments. He would engage you, ask questions, probe. He treated everybody as if he had something to learn from them.

These qualities not only made the Ambassador an exceptional human being, but also, of course, an exceptional diplomat. Knowing how to recognize people, and how to listen to them, defined the way he interacted with individuals at his postings around the world, with people in this General Assembly hall, at the negotiating table, and in leadership positions at the UN.

And these qualities also defined what the Ambassador believed in. A person who sees people as they are, and knows how to hear them, is a natural humanitarian and a natural defender of human rights – as Ambassador Grunditz certainly was, believing to his core that no individual should be treated differently because she is a woman, because of who he or she loves, because of how he or she prays, or because of where she is born.

It is also these qualities that made Marten such a wonderful mentor to his staff. The respect with which he treated people at the Swedish Mission and in previous postings bred a deep loyalty and dedication in those who served under him. It is why, when the Swedish Mission put out a sign-up sheet for staffers to stand by his condolence book and receive visitors, the sheet filled up immediately, and multiple staffers showed up for each shift. It was their way of performing a final service to a man who had taught them so much, and to stand in his honor.

I witnessed that dedication the day Marten passed away. After a meeting hosted by the Swedish Foreign Minister Wallström, a young Swedish diplomat walked me to the elevator, her eyes filled up with tears and she said, “We can’t believe it…He was such a good man.” How right she was. And how shaped she will be, always, by the time that she got to watch him in action, and learn from him.

Ambassador Marten Grunditz gave nearly his entire professional career to the Swedish Foreign Service. It gave him back not only a chance to defend his values and serve his nation, but also led him to his life partner, Maine – who he met decades ago in the diplomatic corps – and who is here with us today. Along with one of the Ambassador’s two children, Genny.

As all of us in this line of work know diplomacy is not a solo occupation; our families serve with us; they weather the excessive hours and the stresses, and they sustain us. As Ambassador Grunditz’s career spanned decades, so did his family’s service alongside him. For that, we are so grateful to you – Maine, and to you, Genny, and of course to your son, Henrik, as well – and we hope that the immeasurable loss you must feel is softened ever so slightly by seeing the tremendous contribution Marten made to his country, to the United Nations, to the causes he believed in, and to all of us – who learned so much from his towering example. Thank you.

DOD PARTICIPATES IN OPERATION UNITED ASSISTANCE TO HELP EBOLA STRICKEN REGIONS

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 

Above Photo:  A group of 30 U.S. military personnel board a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Leopold Sedar Senghor International Airport in Dakar, Senegal, Oct. 19, 2014. The personnel flew to Monrovia, Liberia, where U.S. troops will construct medical treatment units and train health care workers to respond the the Ebola outbreak in West Africa as part of Operation United Assistance. The personnel include Marines, airmen and soldiers assigned to the 101st Airborne Division. U.S. Air National Guard photo by Maj. Dale Greer.

Above Photo:  Aerial porters from the Kentucky Air National Guard’s 123rd Contingency Response Group load a pallet of red blood cells and frozen plasma onto a C-130 Hercules aircraft at Leopold Sedar Senghor International Airport in Dakar, Senegal, Oct. 10, 2014. U.S. Air National Guard photo by Maj. Dale Greer.

U.S. REP. TO UN SAMANTHA POWER'S REMARKS AT GOAL USA ANNUAL BENEFIT BALL

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 

U.S. Mission to the United Nations: Remarks at the GOAL USA Annual Benefit Ball

Samantha Power

U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations 

New York, NY

October 18, 2014

AS DELIVERED

Thank you, everybody. Thank you, Barry, for that generous introduction. Let me also welcome Ambassador David Donoghue – my colleague and co-conspirator – the Irish Ambassador to the United Nations, who is here tonight.

I’m very honored to have been asked to join you for GOAL’s dinner. I’d like to begin, somewhat abruptly, by reading you an excerpt from a news story.

“And there I saw the dying, the living and the dead, lying indiscriminately upon the same floor, without anything between them and the earth, save a few miserable rags. To point to any particular house as a proof of this would be a waste of time as all were in the same state; and not a single house could boast of being free from death and fever, though several could be pointed out with the dead lying close to the living, without any effort being made to remove the bodies to a last resting place.”

Now, this could have been written today about a village or neighborhood in one of the countries most affected by the Ebola outbreak. But it was published in 1847 in the Illustrated London News. The author, a young journalist and artist from Cork, named James Mahoney, was describing the scene he witnessed upon arriving in the town of Bridgetown, in southern Ireland, during the famine.

I begin here because while GOAL is an international humanitarian organization, it is also an Irish organization. GOAL was started by an Irishman, a former sports journalist in fact; an Irish football fan who, like all Irish football fans, was doomed to a life of heartbreak and suffering.

But he decided to dedicate his life to alleviating even greater, truer, suffering around the world.

I begin with the snapshot of the famine because it is impossible to understand the proud tradition of Irish generosity or the passion for service that drives GOALies in the field, without understanding the history of the Irish people.

When people come through an experience as harrowing as the scene that Mahoney described in 1847, empathy is in the bloodstream - it’s in the genes. It was in the bloodstream of my greatest mentor and my best friend, my mother, who brought me to this country from Ireland when I was nine. And I trust and hope it will be in the bloodstream of my kids, Declan and Rian.

These days, people often tell me that my last name, Power, is an appropriate one for representing the United States. What they don’t know, but what probably many of the people in this room do know, is that the surname Power comes from the Irish, de Paor, which means “of the poor.”

With a name like this, and the responsibilities that go with it, how could I not join GOAL tonight, when so many here are gathering in support of an organization that does so much for the most vulnerable and the most poor around the world?

There are so many worthy humanitarian crises that GOAL works on, that the United Nations works on, that the United States government, the Irish government work on; any one of them I could choose to talk about tonight, but I want to focus on Ebola because despite growing international awareness of the outbreak’s severity and mounting commitments, it has to be said, during recent weeks, we are still far behind the terrifying curve of this deadly virus. And the longer we wait to scale up our response, the harder it is for us to bend the curve downward and to stop the exponential spread. That means the greater the risk that we all face, no matter where we live in the world.

GOAL’s experience responding to the outbreak on the ground underscores the extent of the challenges the entire international community faces – and most importantly the infected communities face in dealing with this epidemic. And the interventions by GOAL and partners show how local, targeted interventions can make a profound difference in slowing the spread of this deadly virus.

Let me just give you two examples from the town of Kenema, a district in eastern Sierra Leone. According to Sierra Leone’s Health Ministry, 429 cases of Ebola had been confirmed in Kenema by October 1st – the second highest number of any district in the country of Sierra Leone. More than 20 health care workers in the district had lost their lives treating waves of patients at Kenema’s hospital.

In Sierra Leone, the government tasked the police with taking the lead in maintaining quarantines of people suspected of having infections. However, as GOAL staff in Kenema observed, police had little idea how to quarantine properly. GOALie Gillian McKay wrote in mid-September from Kenema that, “In some cases, police officers can be found sitting on the terrace of a quarantined house, eating food that the family has cooked.” In other cases, she wrote, “Quarantined individuals may be permitted to fetch water or go to the market because as long as they do not run away, the quarantine is being observed in the eyes of the police.”

The consequences of this lack of knowledge were swift and devastating. Not only did the poorly imposed quarantines fail to keep the virus from spreading, but three police officers who were enforcing them were themselves infected and later died. Many more police in Kenema feared they would be next.

Overwhelmed, the local police chief asked GOAL to train his officers in how to safely and effectively implement the quarantine. GOAL developed a training module that balanced the need to prevent the Ebola’s spread with the need to treat possible victims with dignity, rather than as prisoners or pariahs. The training included health professionals as well as Ebola survivors, who could tell the police how it felt to be on the other side of a quarantine – a perspective too rarely taken into account.

The program trained over 2,400 police officers in a month. They in turn have trained other police officers. And since the training began, GOAL reports that no additional Kenema police officers have been infected, and that the quality of quarantines has dramatically improved.

A second example from Kenema of a challenge across the region is the danger of misinformation. Early in the outbreak, word spread through social media in Sierra Leone that washing with salt water could prevent and cure infections. Meanwhile, as more people died in Kenema’s government hospital, a rumor spread that the virus was a sham, and that victims’ bodies were being used for cannibalistic rituals. At the end of July, an angry mob of thousands of people marched on the hospital, threatening to remove patients and bodies and burn the building to the ground. This gives you some sense of the challenge that all who are trying to deal with this epidemic are facing. It is an uphill battle.

At the very least, rumors like these have hampered efforts to contain the virus; at worst, they left countless people more vulnerable to infection. Yet in a climate of growing fear and limited understanding, rumors are spreading as fast as the virus itself.

Interventions by humanitarian aid organizations show, though, how the swift dissemination of accurate, easy-to-understand information can help offset these rumors and undermine the harm that those rumors are causing. In Sierra Leone, for example, public service announcements on local radio stations are now helping to dispel the fiction around false cures. To raise awareness about the causes of infections and the risks of customary practices like hand-washing the bodies of deceased relatives, GOAL and others enlisted the help of community activists, who can build on existing trust and relationships to spread awareness from the grassroots up.

The lack of knowledge among police about how to carry out a safe, effective quarantine, and the spread of these rumors are just two of the many challenges that GOAL and others responding to the crisis have faced, in Kenema and well beyond. Sierra Leone still has only a quarter of the beds it needs for sick patients. Schools in the country have been closed since July. Burial teams continue to lack adequate protection and the protective gear that they need. The list goes on. Guinea and Liberia face many of the same problems, and new problems of their own.

Under President Obama’s leadership, the United States is stepping up to help to address these challenges. We have contributed more than $350 million in humanitarian assistance and deployed more than 600 U.S. government personnel from USAID, from the CDC, and from the Defense Department – it's the largest-ever U.S. response to a global health crisis. We’re committed to sending up to 3,900 U.S. forces to the region and the U.S. military is already overseeing the construction of up to 17 100-bed Ebola Treatment Units, and we’re establishing a training hub where we will train up to 500 health care workers each week on how to safely interact with patients who have contracted this virus.

Some governments in the United Nations are punching well above their weight. I'll give you a couple of examples: Cuba has sent 165 doctors to West Africa – to Sierra Leone, in fact; Timor-Leste has pledged $1 million to the effort, notwithstanding itself, not that long ago, having come out of its own conflict and having tremendous needs at home. Humanitarian organizations too are doing tremendous work. Medecins Sans Frontiers, International Medical Corps, the Red Cross, and GOAL – these are organizations that are on the front lines. These are individuals who comprise these organizations, who are putting themselves into the hot zone because they know that they can remain safe and they know that they can save countless lives; and that they will contribute to putting an end to one of the worst health crises the world has ever seen.

Yet much, much more is needed. According to the UN’s financial tracking service, only 25 counties have pledged $1 million or more to the effort. There are 193 in the United Nations – 25 just. The UN has only received a little more than a third of the funds that they currently need – and that’s just for right now. In Guinea and Sierra Leone, the number of infections is projected to double every three to four weeks; in Liberia, infections are projected to double every 2 weeks. This is bad.

The international community isn’t just losing the race to Ebola. We are getting lapped, at present.

And it’s not just governments and NGOs that have to do their part. It is the private sector and private institutions, philanthropies, and individual donors. Far too few are giving far too little, counting on others to step up. Those of us who have made announcements, like the United States government, have to keep looking to see what more, we too, can do. This is an all hands on deck operation – one in which everyone needs to do his or her part.

Interventions like the ones that I have described in Kenema show that, with the right information and resources, we can slow the spread of this deadly virus. According to data from Sierra Leone’s health ministry, the number of new infections in the Kenema district declined every week of September. This really, really matters.

It is easy to lose sight of what the downward curve really means. It means children, women, and men who – because they were never infected in the first place – have the rest of their lives ahead of them. It means that even in an environment of fear and distrust, people can learn how to keep themselves and their loved ones healthy.

This is an especially important lesson as we witness the spread of fear here in the United States. The fear is understandable. People don’t want hospitals to treat the infected if they believe that health workers at those hospitals will get sick and themselves help spread the virus.

But we know how to care for people with Ebola safely and with compassion. We can give patients a fighting chance of surviving. We just need to ensure that doctors, nurses, and other health professionals get the right training – the training that the doctors and the nurses at Emory and Nebraska had when they successfully adhered to CDC protocols and safely treated those who came from West Africa and nursed them back to health safely.

In closing, one of the most important facts about the famine is that up to a million lives could have been saved. Food was exported from Ireland as people starved. I don’t have to tell this audience that. As a relief inspector wrote in 1846, “A woman with a dead child in her arms was begging in the street yesterday and the Guard of the Mail told me he saw a man with three dead children lying by the roadside. Notwithstanding all this distress, there was a market, plentifully supplied with meat, bread, and fish, – in short, everything.”

Today too, our world has everything that we need to curb the spread of the deadly virus of Ebola. And while it may not be around the corner in a market, we can get the necessary supplies to the infected communities. We can build the Ebola treatment units. We can supply the beds. We can train nurses and manufacture protective gear so that providing help – nursing people back to health – is not itself a perilous endeavor. We just need to act. We need to act more robustly and we need to act far more swiftly. We have the knowledge, we have the resources, and we have the capacity. It is on all of us to marshal the will and conquer the fear to enable us to use them.

Now, as then, hundreds of thousands of people’s lives are at stake. We cannot fail them. We must not fail them.

Thank you so much and thank you GOAL for having me with you this evening. Thank you.

CDC/FRONTIER AIRLINES ASK PASSENGERS ON PLANE WITH 2ND EBOLA PATIENT TO CALL CDC

FROM:  CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 

CDC and Frontier Airlines Announce Passenger Notification Underway

On the morning of Oct. 14, the second healthcare worker reported to the hospital with a low-grade fever and was isolated. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms that the second healthcare worker who tested positive last night for Ebola traveled by air Oct. 13, the day before she reported symptoms.



Because of the proximity in time between the evening flight and first report of illness the following morning, CDC is reaching out to passengers who flew on Frontier Airlines flight 1143 Cleveland to Dallas/Fort Worth Oct. 13.



CDC is asking all 132 passengers on Frontier Airlines flight 1143 Cleveland to Dallas/Fort Worth on October 13 (the flight route was Cleveland to Dallas Fort Worth and landed at 8:16 p.m. CT) to call 1 800-CDC INFO (1 800 232-4636). After 1 p.m. ET, public health professionals will begin interviewing passengers about the flight, answering their questions, and arranging follow up. Individuals who are determined to be at any potential risk will be actively monitored.



The healthcare worker exhibited no signs or symptoms of illness while on flight 1143, according to the crew. Frontier is working closely with CDC to identify and notify passengers who may have traveled on flight 1143 on Oct. 13.  Passengers who may have traveled on flight 1143 should contact CDC at 1 800-CDC INFO (1 800 232-4636).


 Frontier Airlines Statement

 “At approximately 1:00 a.m. MT on October 15, Frontier was notified by the CDC that a customer traveling on Frontier Airlines flight 1143 Cleveland to Dallas/Fort Worth on Oct. 13 has since tested positive for the Ebola virus. The flight landed in Dallas/Fort Worth at 8:16 p.m. local and remained overnight at the airport having completed its flying for the day at which point the aircraft received a thorough cleaning per our normal procedures which is consistent with CDC guidelines prior to returning to service the next day. It was also cleaned again in Cleveland last night. Previously the customer had traveled from Dallas Fort Worth to Cleveland on Frontier flight 1142 on October 10.



Customer exhibited no symptoms or sign of illness while on flight 1143, according to the crew. Frontier responded immediately upon notification from the CDC by removing the aircraft from service and is working closely with CDC to identify and contact customers who may traveled on flight 1143.



Customers who may have traveled on either flight should contact CDC at 1 800 CDC-INFO.



The safety and security of our customers and employees is our primary concern. Frontier will continue to work closely with CDC and other governmental agencies to ensure proper protocols and procedures are being followed.”

DOD VIDEO: ABOUT 100 MARINES ARRIVE IN LIBERIA TO SUPPORT CONTAINMENT OF EBOLA OUTBREAK

READOUT: PRESIDENT OBAMA'S CALL WITH PRIME MINISTER RENZI OF ITALY

FROM:  THE WHITE HOUSE 

Readout of the President's Call with Prime Minister Renzi of Italy

The President spoke this morning with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi about the latest developments in Iraq, Libya, and Ukraine, as well as the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.  On Iraq, the two leaders agreed on the need to ensure humanitarian assistance is reaching vulnerable Iraqis, continue to seek the safety of the civilians on Mount Sinjar, and work together to develop options that will secure the safety of the civilians on Mount Sinjar.  Renzi expressed his support for the United States’ efforts in Iraq.  Both leaders noted the urgency of efforts to counter the threat ISIL poses against all Iraqis and discussed the latest developments in Iraq’s political transition.  On Ukraine, the President and Prime Minister considered the developing situation and reiterated that any intervention under the guise of “humanitarian” assistance must be provided only with the formal, express consent and authorization of the Government of Ukraine, and noted ongoing efforts by the Ukrainian government to deliver humanitarian aid through the ICRC and other recognized international organizations.  They agreed that any Russian steps not in accordance with these requirements would be unacceptable, would violate international law, and would lead to additional sanctions.  On Libya, they emphasized their support for the democratically-elected Council of Representatives and the need to encourage full participation by all elected members while working to end the fighting between militias.  Regarding the growing Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the leaders supported World Health Organization efforts to assist national health services in the region, and agreed on the need for the international provision of additional resources to this effort.

U.S. MILITARY ARE HELPING IN THE FIGHT AGAINST EBOLA OUTBREAK

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 

Military Responders Help Battle Ebola Outbreak

By Terri Moon Cronk and Cheryl Pellerin

DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, Aug. 1, 2014 – Defense Department personnel are on the ground in West Africa and in U.S. laboratories fighting to control the worst outbreak in the African history of the Ebola virus, which a senior Army infectious disease doctor called a “scourge of mankind.”

Army Col. (Dr.) James Cummings, director of the Global Emerging Infections Surveillance and Response System, or GEIS, a division of the Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center, said the battle against the virus since the outbreak began in West Africa in March focuses on trying to stop disease transmission.
At the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control, or CDC, in Atlanta, Director Dr. Tom Frieden has announced that the health agency has raised the travel advisory to Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone where he said the Ebola outbreak is worsening, to Level 3 -- a warning to avoid unnecessary travel to those countries.
CDC already has disease detectives and other staff in those countries to track the epidemic, advise embassies, coordinate with the World Health Organization, or WHO, strengthen ministries of health, and improve case finding, contact tracing, infection control and health communication.

Over the next 30 days, in what Frieden described as a surge, CDC will send another 50 disease-control specialists into the three countries to help establish emergency operations centers and develop structured ways to address the outbreak.

“They will also help strengthen laboratory networks so testing for the disease can be done rapidly,” the director said.

For travelers in and out of the three West African countries, CDC experts will strengthen country capacity to monitor those who may have been exposed to Ebola, and each country in the region has committed to doing this, Frieden said.
“It's not easy to do,” he added, “but we will have experts from our division that do airport screening and try to ensure that people who shouldn't be traveling aren't traveling.”

Frieden said CDC has spoken with air carriers that service the West African region.

“We understand they will continue to fly, which is very important to continue to support the response and maintain essential functions in the country,” he explained.
CDC gives information to travelers to the region and health care providers in the United States who might care for people returning from the infected area. Frieden said that includes medical consultation and testing for patients who may have Ebola.

Frieden said that in the United States, “we are confident that we will not have significant spread of Ebola, even if we were to have a patient with Ebola here. We work actively to educate American health care workers on how to isolate patients and how to protect themselves against infection.”

In fact, he added, “any advanced hospital in the U.S., any hospital with an intensive care unit has the capacity to isolate patients. There is nothing particularly special about the isolation of an Ebola patient, other than it's really important to do it right. So ensuring that there is meticulous care of patients with suspected or … confirmed Ebola is what's critically important.”

The Ebola virus has no known cure and up to a 90 percent fatality rate and only supportive care can be offered to patients diagnosed with the disease while researchers work to find a vaccine.

DoD researchers think the viral disease originated in rural populations that prepare and eat meat from Ebola-carrying gorillas and monkeys.

The virus is passed among animals or people through body fluids. Only a person who is infected and is showing signs of illness can pass the disease to others.
Health care workers and home caretakers who have direct patient contact and those who prepare bodies for burial also are at risk, the infectious disease doctor said.

“We had a large footprint in Africa,” Cummings said of DoD’s response to the first Ebola cases reported in 1976 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, formerly Zaire. Since that time, DoD has answered numerous calls for assistance from WHO, nongovernmental organizations and ministries of heath and defense, he explained.

DoD personnel provide a wide array of support to the Ebola-stricken African nations, from logistical help to guides for clinical management of the virus, Cummings said.

“DoD personnel bring a level of excellence second to none, working in response to host nations and WHO in the most-affected countries of Sierra Leone and Liberia,” he said.