Student World Assembly
Chuetsu Earthquake Action Alert | October 23rd, 2004

Action Alert!

Give a helping hand to the
earthquake victims.

On October 23, an earthquake rocked Niigata Prefecture (a district of Chuetsu) and surrounding areas of Japan. The 6.8 magnitude quake resulted in over 40 deaths and approximately 4,000 injuries. The following aftershocks of the quake triggered many slope failures and landslides, causing the derailment of a Shinkansen bullet train and isolating many villages. Over 100,000 civillians were forced to evacuate their homes, leaving them without any medical supplies, food, and shelter. This has been the worst earthquake to hit Japan since the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake in Kobe, Japan, killing over 6,000 people.

At this stage we encourage our members to donate to the relief organizations that are on the ground helping with the relief effort. You can either donate to local charity organizations that are working on this matter or checkout the following organizations which have set up online donation funds:

www.unicef.org

SWA chapters are encouraged to set-up tables on their campus and community to raise funds for the relief effort and also hold events in order to raise awareness of this pressing issue. Together we can surely make a difference!

By clicking on the links below you will be able to find
background information on the ongoing crisis:

CNN

BBC

Our Mission
The Student World Assembly is a non-governmental, nonpartisan organization created to represent students globally. It provides a deliberative assembly where students around the world can exchange views, vote on global issues through online discussion forums and in annual international conventions, and translate these views into meaningful actions.

Our Democratic Philosophy
The Student World Assembly believes that true global democracy affirms fundamental human rights, which include the dignity and worth of all human beings, the equal rights of men and women, social, economic and cultural justice for every person, and the freedom to promote these causes. SWA’s representative democracy offers a powerful instrument for addressing the vital social and political conditions that threaten our global future. The informed wishes of the people, conveyed through the collective of a democratic assembly, need to be heard in the decision-making processes. By giving students from the most remote to the more accessible institutions an equal voice, we are enabling all students to educate, participate and take action, and to begin thinking of themselves as global citizens.