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RESTON, VA May 28, 1999 -- The Internet Society and The Wladyslaw Poniecki Foundation, of El Cerrito, California, announced today the formation of KosovoNet.org to help reunite families who have been separated during their migration from worn-torn Yugoslavia. The site allows use of the Internet as the vehicle for registration consolidation. KosovoNet.org also hosts an intra-camp communications center with electronic bulletin board posting capability and person-to-person, web-mail communications for Kosovar refugees. More than 1,000,000 ethnic Albanians have fled the hostilities in Yugoslavia, creating the largest forced migration of people in Europe since World War II. The displaced refugees have been relocated not merely within the former Yugoslav territory, but to far more distant countries. Refugees are now in Greece, Turkey, Israel, Germany, neighboring countries such as Macedonia and Albania, and in the United States. While humanitarian assistance continues, matching displaced families can begin across international boundaries using the KosovoNet.org web site. KosovoNet.org hosts a unified, searchable database developed for use by all those who will be called upon to assist the Kosovar refugees worldwide, including humanitarian relief agencies, public institutions and national embassies. The KosovoNet.org Project hopes to facilitate and extend the work of registration volunteers in the field by collating data into a single repository with an easy-to-use interface that can be accessed and used more conveniently by many relief organizations. The need for this unified database is all the more acute since the Kosovo tragedy involves the systematic erasure of identity. Adversaries have destroyed records, deeds, school records, birth and death records, and all traces of lineage and family ties. "This is the first major worldwide crisis to which the Internet community has responded," said Don Heath, president of the Internet Society. "We stand ready to help the real heroes in the field with global and instant communications capabilities. With KosovoNet.org, we are providing a fast, easy and secure means for relief agencies to combine data and expand efforts to reunite Kosovar families. We also hope to bring focus to other efforts being launched among our Internet community." The Internet database will permit storage of names as text, as well as photographs, full motion video and audio files. The Internet Society, through its volunteer members and offices in the United States and Europe, has been involved with international relief agencies. The KosovoNet Project invites relief agencies to share data so that a complete electronic registrar may be built. Refugees will also have access to the database through supporting organizations, as well as access to other accommodations on the site. At the request of USAID, a web mail service has been established on KosovoNet.org for refugees based at Fort Dix, New Jersey, to begin re-establishing connections with family worldwide. The system can be used by refugees anywhere in the world with access to the KosovoNet.org site. While access to the outside world via Internet email is being established, a bulletin board exists as a vehicle for some external, worldwide communications to transpire. For security reasons, postings and email will be monitored and archived so any problems can be addressed constructively. The site will be made available in English and Albanian. Bringing Together the Internet Industry and Humanitarian Communities The Internet Society, which extends the use of the Internet to all sectors, and The Poniecki Foundation, which has been active in humanitarian efforts since 1990, are coordinating the contributions and volunteer efforts of corporate and private donors to apply Internet technologies to the purpose of reuniting families. "This is exactly the type of life-saving and family-preserving application for which the Internet should be used," said Heath. "Our member companies and individual Internet users feel privileged to be involved in this worthwhile endeavor to relieve the human suffering." Internet companies have come together to develop KosovoNet.org. Sun Microsystems has donated a Sun Enterprise Server to host the multimedia applications and Web connections required. Oracle Software is offering database methods including data warehousing, data mining tools and object-oriented retrieval systems. Monetary contributions will also be collected using e-commerce software. Companies such as Virtuosity, a high-tech firm that offers data support for telecomm and its software, Wildfire, which provide voice routing for telephone calls, have jumped on-board to again use technology to solve the humanitarian problem. Among the first local groups to sign on for call center support once the Internet site gains momentum is the Department of Education of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco, California. Teachers and students will work together at the Bay Area Catholic Schools to staff a telephone hotline that includes voice recognition technology. "The outpouring of support for the KosovoNet.org initiative has been overwhelming," said Monica Dodds Grycz, president of The Poniecki Foundation. "We hope this cooperative effort will maximize the work of volunteers in the field, whether they work under the auspices of US humanitarian agencies, the United Nations, or private international relief organizations." The Internet Society The Internet Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring the open evolution, development and use of the Internet for the benefit of all peoples of the world. It is the acknowledged champion and focal point for Internet self-governance, and it is the only organization whose members have been involved in all aspects of the Internet since its inception. The Internet Society has active members in 150 countries, and assumes a leadership role in developing and disseminating Internet policy on technical and societal issues, providing education and training for Internet professionals and generally representing the best interests of the Internet. The Poniecki Foundation The Wladyslaw Poniecki Foundation, Inc. is active in Central and Eastern European countries undergoing the difficult transition from command-driven to more participatory free-market economies. Its mission is to apply technological advances and educate communities on organizing themselves to accomplish social good. As part of a US-AID cooperative agreement and as a subcontractor to the World Wildlife Fund (US), the Foundation translated workbooks on the development and use of electronic networks, and established grassroots "International Organization of Information Specialists" chapters in several countries. It has also been engaged in educational activities in New Delhi, Bogota, Colombia. Activities have included helping to establish an International post-graduate educational center for Information Managers in Central and Eastern Europe at Nicholas Copernicus University in Torun, Poland. The Foundation has published scholarly and educational books in the disciplines of business, education, management, entrepreneurship, medicine, and the environment. For additional information contact:
Czeslaw "Chet" Jan Grycz
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