17 YEARS AND COUNTING came into being as a response to the North/South Civil Society Refugee Warehousing conference held in Geneva, Switzerland near the end of September 2005. The mission here is also driven by personal passion and empathy for refugees who are among those at the top of the list worldwide in terms of need, and at the bottom in regard to their prospects. A number of advocacy strategies arose as the result of the North/South conference to ease the interminable warehousing situation for refugees. Among those strategies, we especially embrace and 'recognize refugees agency and support their leadership and initiative'.

To that end we will work to seek out and support individual refugees worldwide who best speak for, and articulate the issues concerning their particular refugee constituent population; to afford refugees the opportunity to have a voice, to be seen and heard on the world stage in the hope that they might participate in determining their own future.This will be done first by allowing them public exposure here on the website to tell their stories–but also, importantly, a forum-based dialogue that may give rise to further refugee organizational interests around the world.

A second strategy that arose as a result of the conference is to increase 'public education and awareness of refugee rights'. To that end, we seek to reverse the general impression of refugees as helpless and ineffectual–to present refugees as viable, equal members and partners of the international community. As such 17 YEARS AND COUNTING is so named and designed to function as a public clarion call, a slogan intended to link up directly with the issues related to the protracted warehousing of refugees.

Finally, information presented on this website is segregated in layers; a simple, general explanation made available first with a link on the main page, then backed up with additional, more involved discussions of the issues should particular visitor interest require it. Contact us.

HOME