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Within two weeks of Haiti’s January 2010 earthquake, the word had already gone out from the State Department that Bill Clinton would be in charge of U.S. reconstruction efforts. “That means,” one individual told me and I reported in a Jan. 25, 2010 column, “if you don’t have Clinton connections, you won’t be in the game.” The “game,” as my source called it, meant securing hundreds of millions of dollars in no-bid contracts from the State Department’s U.S. Agency for International Development and grants from multilateral institutions like the InterAmerican Development Bank, which gets the bulk of its funding from...

The helicopter was among the relief teams that have been working to help Nepalese after a 7.8-magnitude quake. Relief teams from have been working for weeks to provide water, food, shelter and medical assistance for Nepalese [Reuters] The Nepalese army has said a rescue helicopter has spotted the wreckage of a missing US Marine chopper in the mountains northeast of Kathmandu. Army chief of army operations Major-General Binoj Basnet said on Friday no signs of life could be seen from the air, but could not give any information about the six Marines and two Nepalese army soldiers who were on...

A U.S. Marine helicopter supporting earthquake relief in Nepal was declared missing Tuesday with eight people on board, a military spokesman said. The UH-1Y Huey with two Nepalese soldiers and six U.S. Marines on board disappeared over Charikot, Nepal, at about 10 p.m. local time (12:15 p.m. ET), said U.S. Pacific Command spokesman Army Maj. Dave Eastburn. Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren said the U.S. military is hopeful that the missing helicopter landed and is out of communication. A military official told NBC News there is "no indication that there was a crash" but "it is dark," so they could...

This comes from a UK journalist embedded with the Iraqi military. I wouldn’t treat it as final. Some other reports really raise questions about the 70% number and even the quotes in his own account don’t lead me to believe that such a huge number have died.But it’s safe to say that quite a few are dead. Mount Sinjar stinks of death. The few Yazidis who have managed to escape its clutches can tell you why. “Dogs were eating the bodies of the dead,” said Haji Khedev Haydev, 65, who ran through the lines of Islamic State jihadists surrounding it.On...

European Union families and individuals are increasingly reliant on charity organizations like the Red Cross for basic needs like food, water and shelter. While Germany is relatively unaffected, unemployment and austerity in countries like Spain make the problem even more severe. Two-thirds of national Red Cross societies within the European Union distribute food aid -- a sign that the economic crisis in Europe has an alarming effect on poverty. Yves Daccord, Director-General of the International Committee of the Red Cross, said that the scope of food distribution is the highest since the end of World War II. The Spanish Red...

Gov. Cuomo says the Department of Defense will set up emergency mobile fuel stations at five locations around the New York City metro area. Free gasoline will be distributed, with a 10-gallon per-person limit, Cuomo announced at a briefing today.

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama voiced condolences to Japan Friday for the people who perished in a massive earthquake, saying the United States "stands ready to help" in any way it can. At the same time, Obama said in a statement that his administration will "continue to closely monitor tsunamis around Japan and the Pacific going forward" and he directed the Federal Emergency Management Agency to be ready to help if U.S. states or territories are struck.

All I have at the moment, from the Kyodo site: BREAKING NEWS: Japan requests cooperation from U.S. military after quake.

Samaritan’s Purse President Franklin Graham returned to Haiti today to survey our work with cholera patients, hand deliver Operation Christmas Child shoe box gifts to hurting children, visit shelter communities we built in the aftermath of the January earthquake, tour our rubble removal activities, and debrief with staff on water, sanitation, shelter, targeted feeding, training programs, and 2011 needs. Samaritan’s Purse teams have been working in Haiti since the country was devastated by a deadly earthquake in January. Still struggling to recover from the quake, the Haitian people have more recently suffered from the growing cholera epidemic that has already...

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is heading to Haiti this weekend with evangelist Franklin Graham, a Palin source confirmed to POLITICO. Palin and Graham will visit a cholera clinic in addition to other stops, as was first reported by CNN. The Haiti visit was the second foreign trip to surface Thursday. Palin is also planning possible visits next year to Israel and Britain. The Haiti trip could serve two distinct political purposes for Palin. First, it provides an opportunity to expand her image and policy portfolio beyond her limited image as a darling of the tea party movement. Second, she'll...

Haiti's voodoo high priest has claimed believers have been discriminated against by evangelical Christians who are monopolising aid sent to the earthquake-stricken country.... Max Beauvoir, Haiti's "supreme master" of voodoo, alleged his faith's opponents had deliberately prevented much-needed help from reaching followers of the religion, which blends the traditional beliefs of West African slaves with Roman Catholicism. "The evangelicals are in control and they take everything for themselves," he claimed. "They have the advantage that they control the airport where everything is stuck. They take everything they get to their own people and that's a shame Christians have also been...

January 30, 2010   A barge carrying 400 tons (800,000 pounds) of Samaritan’s Purse emergency relief supplies arrived in Haiti on Friday. An assortment of heavy equipment was also on board, including a bulldozer, dump trucks, skid loaders, and flatbed trucks to help with debris removal, access clearing, hauling, and other difficult tasks.“One of the first things I want to do is help rebuild secure perimeters around churches to help them be established as distribution points for the community,” said Ken Isaacs, the vice president of projects for Samaritan’s Purse. “One of the first jobs we’ll tackle with the excavator is...

ARLINGTON, Va. – As humanitarian relief continues in Haiti, the Army National Guard stands ready to provide personnel and equipment to support the mission, senior Army Guard officials said today. "We stand by ready, willing and able to assist as soon as they sort out what the requirements are and what they want the Army Guard to fill," said Army Col. David Aycock, deputy chief of staff of operations for the Army Guard. Currently, a Puerto Rico Army National Guard unit is the only Army Guard unit participating in relief operations in Haiti. "The Puerto Rico Army National Guard with...

Despite days trapped under rubble in searing heat, rescue teams are still pulling people out alive from beneath the concrete of Port-au-Prince. An Israeli relief team managed to bring out a 22-year-old man suffering from dehydration. Earlier an 84-year-old woman was saved from certain death after being retrieved from a wrecked building. (Video at link.)

Rescue workers scouring the wreckage of the devastated Haitian capital are still pulling people alive from the rubble, more than a week after quake struck. A young woman was extracted from a ruined supermarket by the combined efforts of teams from Turkey, France and Haiti. One rescue worker spoke of the thrill of finding someone alive after all this time:

Medical staff in Haiti have been forced to carry out operations without anaesthetic as they waited for assistance in treating those injured in the earthquake. The desperation in the town of Leogane should not be under-estimated. To the west of Port-au-Prince, it was at the epicentre of the earthquake. Incredible as it may seem 90% of the buildings collapsed in just seven seconds. Medicine Sans Frontiers has just arrived. They are trying to treat last Tuesday's injuries today. Until now nobody has made it to the town. The screams of a little girl echo in the make-shift surgery that has...

America is to send 2,200 extra troops to Haiti to help with security and the distribution of food and water to earthquake survivors. Massive amounts of aid have been promised. Massive amounts have arrived at Port au Prince airport. But nearly a week after the tremor, desperately needed supplies are only just beginning to reach those who need it most. (Video at link)

ABOARD THE USS CARL VINSON — Helicopters sit ready to go from this US aircraft carrier off Haiti, but there's a problem: after a day of frantic aid runs there is simply nothing left to deliver. Aboard the warship some 3,500 US military personnel have been coordinating the flights of 19 US helicopters carrying aid since early morning. SNIP In less than 12 hours, helicopters from the USS Carl Vinson made some 20 trips to scout the ravaged landscape and deliver items that were originally intended for the ship's crew. Among the supplies dropped off were thousands of bottles of...

ARLINGTON, Va. — Top defense officials have ruled out airdropping food, water and medical supplies over Haiti, fearing that chaos would be the unintended result. “It seems to me that without having any structure on the ground, in terms of distribution, that an airdrop is simply going to lead to riots as people try and go after that stuff,” said Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Friday. On Thursday, an Air Force official said that a lack of fuel and equipment was slowing air operations at the Port-au-Prince airport. The first of the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson’s 19 helicopters have...

Alexandria, VA (January 13, 2010) – The Salvation Army is mobilizing resources and personnel to assist with the international relief effort in Haiti following a severe earthquake Tuesday that damaged much of the country’s infrastructure, housing and commercial buildings. The Salvation Army has had a presence in Haiti since 1950 and currently operates schools, clinics, a hospital, feeding programs, children's homes and church-related activities spread across two major facilities in Port au Prince, close to the epicenter of the earthquake and at other locations in the country. One of the facilities, or compounds as it is referred to, includes a...