We had a busy summer quarter - here's a quick report-back on our coaching, training, and advocacy, as well as some exciting growth at the home front.

Celebrating our Fifth Anniversary-Board Matching Still Available

This year, Asia Catalyst celebrates five years of helping to build grassroots groups in East and Southeast Asia. As part of our "New Generation of Leaders" 5th Anniversary Campaign, our board of directors has generously promised to match your donations dollar for dollar.  That means a donation of $100 doubles to $200, and $500 will double to $1000! Please make a tax-deductible gift here.

Your gift of $100 or more gets you a lovely gift book -- with photos and background on our inspiring partners in China and Southeast Asia.

TRAINING FOR GRASSROOTS GROUPS

UNAIDS Rights, Gender and Community Mobilization Department strongly encourages the AIDS community to engage actively in these discussions to ensure that health and HIV remain high on the post 2015 agenda and that the experiences of community activism from people living with HIV, the rights and gender activists and broader AIDS community can inform and shape this important future agenda.

By Brian Bonci

A new report from three UN agencies, "Sex Work and the Law," finds no 

evidence from countries of Asia and the Pacific that criminalization of sex work has prevented HIV epidemics among sex workers and their clients."  The new report, from the UN Development Programme (UNDP), the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) and UNAIDS examines 48 countries in Asia and the Pacific to assess laws, legal policies and law enforcement practices that affect the human rights of sex workers and impact on the effectiveness of HIV responses. 

By Mike Frick

The website Seeing Red in China recently published a translation of Dr. Wang Shuping's first-person account of how she discovered China's HIV tainted blood disaster while working as a physician in Henan Province in the early 1990s. A hepatologist by training, Dr. Wang first observed widespread hepatitis C contamination in samples collected from plasma donors. Knowing hepatitis C and HIV could both be transmitted through blood, Dr. Wang used her own savings to establish a center that began testing blood donors for HIV. Among the first 409 samples she tested in 1995, she found that 13% tested positive for HIV. These findings earned her rebuke and harassment from local officials, who shut down her clinical testing center and tried to suppress her findings.

Dr. Wang's story provides a personal account of the early years of the Chinese HIV epidemic when physicians began to discover the frightening extent of central China's contaminated blood supply. Subsequent efforts to secure compensation for the tens of thousands of people affected by the disaster have been unsuccessful, as a January 2012 joint report by Asia Catalyst and the Korekata AIDS Law Center showed.

In 2001, Dr. Wang left China for the United States, where she worked as a hepatitis C researcher for many years. She is currently studying for a degree in public health.

Read the English version of her account on Seeing Red in China and the original Chinese on the overseas advocacy website Can Yu.

On October 18th, South Korea was elected to the Asia-Pacific non-permanent seat of the United Nations Security Council, after human rights activists highlighted rights abuses in Cambodia, its main challenger.  In a press release issued earlier this week, Global Witness argued,"Cambodia should not be given a seat on the United Nations Security Council while its ruling elite continues to commit widespread human rights abuses and sell off vast tracts of land and forest for private gain."

On October 18th, South Korea was elected to the Asia-Pacific non-permanent seat of the United Nations Security Council, after human rights activists highlighted rights abuses in Cambodia, its main challenger.  In a press release issued earlier this week, Global Witness argued,"Cambodia should not be given a seat on the United Nations Security Council while its ruling elite continues to commit widespread human rights abuses and sell off vast tracts of land and forest for private gain."

[1.5 CLE credits available]

Social and political attitudes towards sexual orientation and gender identity are changing rapidly in China.  Vibrant new LGBT networks have sprung up around the country.  Authorities tacitly accept a degree of activism by social organizations working on LBGT issues.  And official attitudes toward the legal status of LGBT individuals and communities are evolving, as represented by the first tentative (but unsuccessful) legislative proposals to recognize gay marriage. At the same time, activists report widespread discrimination against LGBT people, and Chinese media have reported on several hate crimes in recent years. 

What do these changes signify? This talk will feature American and Chinese legal experts and NGO activists on the legal status of LGBT communities in China, and on efforts by Chinese activists to strengthen anti-discrimination and promote social inclusion. The event is organized by the Catalyzers, a group of professionals who raise awareness about health and human rights and generate support for our partners in Asia. A short reception will follow.

Location:              Fordham University Law School

Time:                    Wednesday November 7, 2012, 4 to 6 pm

Registration is limited. Email us at info@asiacatalyst.org to get on the list; we will contact you when registration opens. 

UPDATE: Registration is now open.  Please register at: http://chinascomrades.eventbrite.com/

The 23rd International Harm Reduction Conference will be held on 9th - 12th of June, 2013, in Vilnius, Lithuania, and is being organised by Harm Reduction International in partnership with the Eurasian Harm Reduction Network. The official conference theme is 'The Value/s of Harm Reduction', which will provide focus on the urgent need to ensure sufficient political and financial support to address the HIV epidemic driven by injecting drug use in many parts of the world, and well as the ethical basis of the harm reduction philosophy.

第23界国际降低伤害大会将于2013年6月9-12日|为在立陶宛首都 维尔纽斯召开。大会主题为"降低伤害的价值"，主要关注世界各地毒品注射而导致的艾滋病感染问题，呼吁针对该问题号召全球政治与经济支持。