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Suzanne Steele recalls a winter where dozens of children in a Kabul refugee camp froze to death.

Embedded with the Canadian Forcesin Afghanistan as Canada's War Poet, Steele wanted to give voice to those children and the countless others who have died due to war in that country.

In thesymphonic piece, Afghanistan: Requiem for a Generation, which is having its Vancouver premiere Friday, Steele attempts to do that with a choir of Langley children.

The music was written by composer Jeffrey Ryan. Steele wrote the words.

"It was extremely important for me that their voices were heard," she told On The Coast's Lisa Christiansen. "If we could rain thousands and thousands of tons of ordinance on the desert, against each other, why can't we rain blankets for these children?"

Steele's requiemis the product of her time as an artist in the war torn nation with the 1st Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry from 2008 to 2010.

The Vancouver-born Steele says the traditional Catholic song for the dead is the most appropriate way of expressing what she witnessed duringthat time.

The day after Remembrance Day 2010 was when Steele began working on the project with Ryan, the composer,who is also based in Vancouver.

They spent two yearson it, attempting to capture the experiences of soldiers and civilians.

Suzanne Steele (centre) with Canadian soldiers training at CFB Wainwright before deploying to Afghanistan. (warpoet.ca)

"We try to evoke the response after a soldier steps on an [improvised explosive device]," Steele said. "I asked Jeff, could we have SOS in Morse code embedded into? Dit-dit-dit-daht-daht-daht-dit-dit-dit."

Ryan says the hour-long requiem, performed with a children's choir, an adult choir, four soloists and an orchestra in four languages English, French, Latin and Pashtun was challenging to put together.

But it's also important, he says, especially because of its timing.

"It's [about] 100 years since World War I, the war that supposed to end all wars," he said. "I think it's really important to remind everyone these things are still happening, that 'the war to end all wars' didn't end all wars.

"What are we going to do about that?"

With files from CBC Radio One's On The Coast

War poet Suzanne Steele (left) and composer Jeffrey Ryan are the collaborators behind Afghanistan: Requiem for a Generation. (Lisa Christiansen/CBC)

To hear the full story, click the audio labelled:Canadian war poet tells story of Afghanistan in requiem with VSO

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Canadian war poet tells story of Afghanistan in requiem with VSO - CBC.ca

January 26, 2017 6:35 PM By Derrick Blakley

(CBS) President Trump was in Philadelphia today following his first interview with ABC News, where he took another swipe at Chicago crime.

Its horrible carnage. This isAfghanistan is not like whats happening in Chicago. People are being shot left and right, he said.

CBS 2s Derrick Blakley reports.

Chicago civic leaders at the City Club disputed the presidents dire view.

Chicago is not Afghanistan. It does make a good tweet, said Urban League CEO Shari Runner.

It does make good media play. But the city is not a war zone and we should not treat it as such, she added.

But city club speakers dont want to sugarcoat Chicagos homicide problem. The city has seen a 58% spike in murders from 2016.

Jens Ludwig of the University of Chicago Crime lab said his group looked at data from the five largest cities in the US in the past 25 years.

Not a single city has experienced a change of this size, he said.

President Trump thinks the violence problem can be fixed by getting tougher and stronger and smarter.

In response to getting tougher on crime, Chicago Police Department Patrol Chief Fred Waller cracked a joke about the absence of his boss, Eddie Johnson, saying hes back at headquarters opening the waterboarding kit that Washington sent us.

Congresswoman Robin Kelly has already gone directly to the top, inviting the new president to her district.

Hes talking about carnage and this, that and the other. Let him meet some of the people, let him see whats going on, she said.

According to Ludwig, a quarter of Chicagos murder suspects are under age 19, which is far higher than other cities.

This means mentoring programs, like those promoted by Mayor Emanuel, could make an impact.

Three quarters of murder suspects are young adults as well, meaning better education, job training and access to actual jobs could benefit them.

Derrick Blakley is a general assignment reporter for CBS 2 Chicago. Send An E-Mail To Derrick Blakley In June 2003, Blakley returned to CBS after 15 years at NBC 5 Chicago. Previously, he had worked for CBS News for seven years, based in...

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Chicago Leaders Fire Back At Trump's Afghanistan Reference - CBS Local

In the third part of Refugees DeeplysReturn to Afghanistan series, Umer Ali meets transgender refugees who fear that being forced to leave Pakistan amounts to a death sentence.

PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN You cannot talk to Gulalai in the language of her adopted country. Despite living in Pakistan for the past 17 years, she has been unable to properly learn Urdu and remains confined to her native Pashto. As a member of the transgender community, language is just one of the barriers she faces.

I never learned Urdu because I rarely go out of the small world we have created for ourselves [to stay safe], she says in Pashto.

Gulalai left Afghanistan when she was only eight years old. Now a shy 25-year-old, she speaks only when spoken to.

Whatever the constraints of her life in Pakistan, she is certain that it offers a better future than her birth country, to which Pakistan is coercing waves of former refugees to return.

Only fragments of memory remain from Gulalais childhood somewhere in the suburbs of the capital, Kabul. She was born a boy but realized as a small child that she was meant to be a girl. Her parents were determined she would grow up to be a man, and when she failed to live up to this, they beat her.

The punishments were harsh and relentless. Aged eight, she found the courage to run away. From Kabul she made her way to Jalalabad, where she found some protection from others in what we would now know as the transgender community.

All that is left from her family memories are some pain and wistful thoughts of her lost younger brother. She remembers him having a limp, but cannot recall his name. I always wonder what happened to him, she says.

Once in Pakistan, she was introduced to someone she was told was a guru an elder in the transgender community who took her in. Like so many trans youngsters, she grew into one of the only professions open to her, that of a dancer.

Most of the transgender people are either thrown out or run away from their homes at an early age, says Farzana Jan, a transgender activist whose home in Peshawar is a meeting point for the community. One of the leaders of rights group Trans Action Alliance, based in the capital of KP (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) province, she explains the bind that Gulalai and others are in: They neither get formal education nor any professional training. So they cant get into a profession deemed respectable by the rest of society.

Among those who do not become dancers, Farzana says, many find work on Dalazak Road, Peshawars red-light district. Dancers are in demand for public events such as weddings, and Gulalai remembers how she shook with fear on her first outings.

I realized that I would have to dance in order to survive because my guru expected me to earn money. We are often teased, groped and abused by men.

However, even this precarious life is now under threat.

Pakistan is determined to send Afghan refugees back, after a string of terror attacks blamed on Afghan insurgents. Many Afghans face police harassment in Pakistan and have elected reluctantly to return. But even this option is complicated for Gulalai.

Im neither an Afghan national nor a Pakistani national, she says, her face wrinkling into tears.

Umer Ali

Gulalais estrangement from her family means she has no record of her birth or paperwork to support her Afghan citizenship. Unable to prove her Afghan nationality, she has not been registered by authorities in Pakistan as a refugee.

When a deadline was announced for Afghans to leave Pakistan, many transgender refugees turned to Farzana Jan for help and advice. I told them I would try my best, but even then, I knew I couldnt do much, she says.

Life without papers is claustrophobic for Gulalai. She cannot travel to other cities without an I.D. card to show at the security checkpoints; this also prevents her from something as straightforward as having a cellphone registered in her name.

I cant have a SIM [card] in my name because Im not registered in the Pakistani governments database.

Gulalai shudders at the notion of going back to Afghanistan. Like all members of the trans community, she has heard the horrific tales of violence in the country of her childhood.

We have received several videos of violence against the transgender community in Afghanistan, says Farzana. In many areas of Afghanistan, the body parts of transgender people are chopped off before they are killed.

She relates the story of one transgender Afghan refugee who left Pakistan three years ago. She started dancing at weddings in Jalalabad [in eastern Afghanistan], but was soon arrested by the police because its forbidden to do so.

Shes still stuck in an Afghan jail where shes forced to live in the mens section, often getting harassed and abused.

The U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR), which is facilitating the return of hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees from Pakistan, has faced criticism for legitimizing what critics say amounts to forced returns.

Duniya Aslam Khan, the UNHCR spokesperson in Pakistan, says the agency is aware of fears among the Afghan trans community and would make them a priority: Transgender people are more than welcome to contact us to discuss their issues. We understand their issues and are very sensitive toward them.

Trans Action Alliance says they have repeatedly approached the UNHCR for help in registering stateless transgender refugees, but received no response.

Gulalais fears are shared by Sapna, a 22-year-old transgender Afghan who identifies as male, who came to Pakistan with his parents in the 1980s. Sapna is a self-taught tailor and embroiderer, but has struggled to find work in Peshawar.

He says that he survives thanks to the close bonds of the trans community, some of whom bring their clothes to him to repair. Like Gulalai, Sapna is stateless a citizen of neither Pakistan nor Afghanistan.

In other countries, if you were born and lived there for 10 years you could acquire their nationality but not in Pakistan, he complains. I dont want to go back to Afghanistan and get butchered there. I would prefer to be punished by the Pakistani government.

Amna Nasir contributed to this report.This article originally appeared onRefugees Deeply. For weekly updates and analysis about refugee issues, you cansign up to the Refugees Deeply email list.

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Transgender Refugees In Pakistan Fear Death Upon Return Home To Afghanistan - Huffington Post

MATT SHAND

Last updated14:23, January 27 2017

Supplied

These four medals are identical to the ones stolen from Mark Doohan during a burglary. The former serviceman is requesting the burglar return the items somehow to him.

Areturned serviceman has had his service medals stolen in a callous home burglary.

Now he is calling on the burglars to do the right thing and return the irreplaceable items.

Mark Doohanand Mia Spillman came back to their Taupo home after spending lastweekend away to discover their TV was missing.

Supplied

Engraving on the edge of each medal will read U1019171 LCPL M R DOOHAN.

"It was then we realised someone had broken in," Spillman said.

They did not realise what had been taken until a few hours later as Doohan searched the home which revealedthe extent of the burglary.

Thethieves have taken acurious mixture of items including two blocks of cheese, wine bottlesand all the socks from the drawers.

Supplied

These four medals are identical to the ones stolen from Mark Doohan during a burglary. The former serviceman is requesting the burglar return the items somehow to him.

"We noticed they had gone through the drawers and I had a thought to check the drawer where the medals were," Doohan

"They are not valuable medals at all but they hold a lot of sentimental value and I would like to get them back."

The medals stolen included (in order of them pictured) were a New Zealand operational service medal, Afghanistan primary service medal, NATO non article five for ISAF medal and the defence service medal with regular clasp.

Supplied

These four medals are identical to the ones stolen from Mark Doohan during a burglary. The former serviceman is requesting the burglar return the items somehow to him.

The medals were encased in a black cordua zip case, similar to a CD case but slightly larger.

Each of the medals had engraving along the bottom edge with the words, "U1019171LCPLM RDOOHAN" written on them.

While the medals will be worth nothing in resale, they cannot be replaced.

"They are a one-off issue for the lifetime of the person," Doohan said.

"It means you can't get a replacement you can only get replicas for them."

Doohan hopes the thieves, or someone who knows who took the medals, will return the items to him.

"Even if they just left them somewhere and told someone what they were," he said.

"I don't care about the rest of the items."

Information about the identity of the thieves, or anything that might assist police, can be given to Crime Stoppers on 0800 555 111.

If someone has located the medals, and wants to return them anonymously, they can return them to the Taupo Times office at 86 Ruapehu Street, Taupo or send them to Po Box 205 Taupo.

-Stuff

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Afghanistan war medals stolen - Stuff.co.nz

Trumps crackdown on immigration drew immediate protest nationwide. Thousands of people poured into New York Citys Washington Square Park Tuesday night holding candles and signs reading "No One Is Illegal." Vigils and rallies were also held outside Los Angeles City Hall and at the Columbia Heights Civic Plaza in Washington, D.C. This is Debbie Almontaser, president of the Muslim Community Network, speaking in Manhattan Tuesday night.

Debbie Almontaser: "Im a community activist here in New York City. Im also a Yemeni-American who actually still has family back in Yemen. Shortly after the war, many members of my family were actually able to flee, such as my daughter and her husband. But sadly, as we speak, my brother-in-laws wife remains in Yemen. He actually began the petitioning for her, and she was in Jordan and awaiting just to finish her paperwork. And now, with this executive order, I very much doubt that she will be able to join her two daughters and husband, who are already here."

That was Debbie Almontaser. And this is another protester who is originally from Sudan.

Shadin Awad: "My name is Shadin Awad. And I think its quite ironic that there is a ban, or there is a potential ban, on people from Sudan and people from a lot of Muslim countries, in general, where the U.S. has played a direct hand in disenfranchising the people of those countries. The U.S. has played a direct hand in even the genocide that occurred in Darfur. I think its really ironic that, you know, now its however many years later, theyre saying, 'Oh, we don't want you. We dont want you after we messed up your country. We dont want you after weve disenfranchised your people. We dont want you after weve disenfranchised the world. You know, as the U.S., we meddle, we go everywhere. The U.S. goes everywhere and then says, 'No, we don't want you anymore."

Following Trumps executive orders, hundreds of people also marched through the streets in Kensington, Brooklyna predominantly working-class immigrant communityand gathered for a press conference to announce the launch of a "Hate-Free Zone." The community defense program is one of a series of efforts by neighborhood groups nationwide to mobilize residents to organize their own security against hate attacks and police brutality. In the wake of Trumps election, verbal and physical hate attacks against immigrants, LGBT people, African Americans and religious minorities have increased dramatically. Last week, 27 Jewish community centers nationwide received bomb threats, after 16 JCCs received bomb threats the week before. Other examples include a swastika and the word "Trump" being graffitied onto a high school in Cincinnati, Ohio, and onto a library in Northbrook, Illinois.

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Afghanistan Orders Arrest of VP's Bodyguards, After Reports of Rape & Torture - Democracy Now!