Dr. Burkhard Luber (peace researcher) is a friend of our Foundation Board President Felix Walz. He recently spoke in his distance learning course for the BTFS team in Monrovia about the so called "New Wars" in our time. He points out the differences of today's civil wars in the southern countries compared to the "old wars" of the 20th century:
For me, these are also evidence of the many instabilities in the world. The saber rattling of the great rulers; states of war and terror which fuel the fears. Where are the boundaries between peace and war still visible today?
Refugees, climate change, fake news, cybercrime, radicalization, social media, natural disasters, scarcity of raw materials, and epidemic phenomena create additional areas of tension. In parallel, countless aid organizations, NGOs, and individualists who "want to help" are on the move in these arenas.
While alliances on one side, seemingly well-moneyed, carry out destabilizing actions, the efforts of humanitarian organizations appear to have more of a "drop in the bucket" effect.
Statt geeint gemeinsame und wirkungsvolle Strategien zu entwickeln und zu realisieren, macht jeder was er für richtig hält. Geschenke hier, Geldtransfer dort und alle sind glücklich, weil man ja sozial war?
Our foundation relies on cooperation with the consistent involvement of the needy population. In this way, the most pressing problems can be localized "on the ground", goals formulated and only then realized in concrete projects. - In this way we can meet the demands of "HELPING YOURSELF to do justice" - Felix F. Walz Bowier Trust Foundation Switzerland
"Well - I'm Theresa Alpha - the administrator of the Carver Mission Clinic, which is located at Carver Mission Academy. We have had a very good working relationship with BTFS for about a year. Currently, we have received medical donations and this is the second time. The first donation was in May 2019 when we received medical supplies and medications. BTFS promised to come back in November to conduct a training program for nurses and our staff. This training was very successful and our students were also allowed to participate. I personally think the training is very good. We are in a third world country and what our nurses learned during the training are procedures that they use in their daily lives. We have received medicines, antibiotics, painkillers and hospital shoes for our staff to wear proudly. In addition, we have received baby food because Liberia still has malnourished children and we use the food for that purpose. Also, we have a Nurse College where we train our nurses in practical procedures where they learn how to check vital signs on a patient, how to take care of patients, how to handle CPR (resuscitation) and many other measures. The school also teaches students how to insert an NGT (nasal tube) and how to perform the specific treatment claims for women and men. For this reason, we decided to share some of the medical equipment from BTFS (Spital Linth) with the Demo Lab staff. We received surgical gloves for examination and other items for our clinic. Marcel (Note by F. Walz: Marcel Buchmann, Head of Nursing, LINTH Hospital) did an assessment of our conditions in May 2019 and we look forward to that collaboration continuing. We say thank you to BTFS and can't wait until Marcel is back"
(Translation: Felix F. Walz)