The Edge to Replace Instruments for Musicians Affected by Hurricane Harvey

U2 guitarist began Music Rising after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

The Edge announced he is raising funds to replace the instruments lost by musicians impacted Hurricane Harvey. The U2 guitarist began his charity Music Rising, in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina.

"You might recall that Edge – when Hurricane Katrina did its damage to New Orleans and destroyed the lives of so many musicians there – he put together Music Rising," The Edge's U2 bandmate, Bono, said in an interview with Boston radio station Mix 104.1.


"And it was a really clever way of getting the musicians of the area some instruments so they could continue to live."

Though exact plans for the recovery effort haven't solidified just yet, Bono noted that "Edge has been in discussions now to do the same [work] in Houston. And you know, we have private ways that we will respond, but publicly that's what we're doing."

Donations for those affected by Harvey can be made on the Music Rising website.




http://www.rollingstone.com

Bono at the Munich Security Conference in Germany

 

Bono, (Paul David Hewson), 56, is the lead singer of the band U2 and co-founder of „One“, a campaigning organisation which fights to end poverty and preventable diseases. This is the English version of Bono’s Op-Ed which was published in Süddeutsche Zeitung on February 17th, 2017.


Germany should be leading in an initiative of the G-20 states in terms of development and security.
If your eyes roll at international gatherings like the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Summit this week in Bonn or the Security Conference I’ll be attending this weekend in Munich, let me confess, mine used to as well. But after nearly two decades of harassing and attending such gatherings, I’ve discovered the dirty little secret of these events is they’re often not just talking shops. For example, the last three G8 or G7 summits hosted by Germany were turning points on debt cancellation, fighting AIDS and promoting food security.
At a time like this, when the very concept of global cooperation is being bizarrely questioned, Europeans like myself give thanks for such German leadership. In the humanity of its response to the refugee crisis, Germany has turned the thought of Europe into a feeling. In having the foresight to place strategic cooperation with Africa centrally on the G20 agenda, Germany is showing leadership again by identifying both the economic opportunity of Europe’s massive neighbouring continent while acknowledging the stability risks that may lie ahead if this partnership does not go well.
The civil war in Syria makes this only too clear in the upheaval not only to human lives but to our collective institutions and our shared understandings, upending the very idea of Europe. And Syria is not the only country on the fault line of chaos, not the only ungoverned space where violent extremism is on the rise. Keep in mind: Syria is—or was—a country of roughly 20 million people. Egypt, however, has a population of 93 million. And Nigeria, 186 million. What would we do if a country ten times the size of Syria combusts? I saw the situation in Northeast Nigeria a few months ago – and witnessed the destruction wrought by Boko Haram in the eyes of Amina, a 20-year-old displaced mother of 6 malnourished kids whose husband had been lost to Boko Haram. How Amina raises kids rather than extremists is not a distant concern. I don’t think Nigeria is going to burst into flames—though that is the stated objective of Boko Haram. But if it does, our countries are not prepared to handle it—politically, economically, or militarily. That’s what I hear from every military leader and security expert I talk to.

Security without development is unsustainable

They also say this: prevention is cheaper than intervention. By “prevention,” they’re referring to our non-military tools—the tools it takes to improve human conditions on the ground, and bring stability to fragile states. We need to unite our security strategy with a development strategy that ensures that these countries will put their people first and provide what the healthcare, education and infrastructure they need. Development without security is impossible, but security without development is unsustainable.
If we get this wrong, fragile states become failed states, and their problems become our problems. But if we get this right… their success will be our success, too. Their stability will aid in our own.
So how can the G20 help these countries succeed? Ask the people of Africa—as we at ONE have—and you hear three things: education, employment, and empowerment. Here is what that could mean in practice, if the G20 rolls up its sleeves and implements some plans.
Education: we need a plan to make sure all girls can go to school. If this seems obvious, 130 million girls in world wide would disagree; to them, it’s a dream. For every extra year a girl goes to school, her income goes up 12%. If she learns to read, her future child is 50% more likely to live past the age of five. Some studies suggest that providing education to youth can reduce a country’s risk of conflict by 20%.

Africa’s workforce - a missed opportunity

Employment: Africa’s population is set to double from 1.2bn to 2.5bn by 2050. This energetic restless generation finds work or it’ll find trouble. The continent’s rising generation will be a demographic dividend if and only if African leaders and partners scale proven jobs initiatives while implementing reforms to harness their own resources. This dividend can and should be mutually beneficial to Germany. I’m told only 1000 of the 400,000 German companies operating abroad are engaged at all in Africa. There’s no way to see this as anything other than a missed opportunity. Minister Schäuble’s “Compacts with Africa” is course correction.

Empowerment: Reform is key to empowering citizens and encouraging more investment. More than any disease, corruption is a killer—draining money that is supposed to be spent on education, health care, and employment. Germany is the deciding player to ensure European laws support the fight against corruption and capital flight. That’s why it must lead the EU to expose who owns dodgy shell companies and trusts, and lead the G20 to offer increased cooperation and investment conditional to governance. This can help fast-track the anti-corruption agenda, turbo-charging the transparency movement of connected young people who wield their phones as tracking devices.
I’m excited to talk about these ideas in Germany this week, because there’s no country that understands the connection between development and security as Germany does. Polling shows that 84 percent of Germany support more financial support for African countries. Compassionate and smart. Perhaps this enlightenment is the enduring legacy of the Marshall Plan, which helped lift this country out of destruction and despair, and helped put this continent on a stable footing for the past half a century? Maybe that’s also why we’re now hearing some in Germany echo African leaders, like Aliko Dangote, Africa’s richest businessman and philanthropist, and Akin Adesina, President of the African Development Bank, who call for a modern Marshall Plan. The details and circumstances are of course so different, but the level of ambition is accurate, because the stakes are equally historic.






 http://international.sueddeutsche.de/

Bono: Time to Think Bigger About the Refugee Crisis

Bono with kids at a refugee camp 

I’VE recently returned from the Middle East and East Africa, where I visited a number of refugee camps — car parks of humanity. I went as an activist and as a European. Because Europeans have come to realize — quite painfully in the past year or two — that the mass exodus from collapsed countries like Syria is not just a Middle Eastern or African problem, it’s a European problem. It’s an American one, too. It affects us all.

My countryman Peter Sutherland, a senior United Nations official for international migration, has made clear that we’re living through the worst crisis of forced displacement since World War II. In 2010, some 10,000 people worldwide fled their homes every day, on average. Which sounds like a lot — until you consider that four years later, that number had quadrupled. And when people are driven out of their homes by violence, poverty and instability, they take themselves and their despair elsewhere. And “elsewhere” can be anywhere.

But with their despair some of them also have hope. It seems insane or naïve to speak of hope in this context, and I may be both of these things. But in most of the places where refugees live, hope has not left the building: hope to go home someday, hope to find work and a better life. I left Kenya, Jordan and Turkey feeling a little hopeful myself. For as hard as it is to truly imagine what life as a refugee is like, we have a chance to reimagine that reality — and reinvent our relationship with the people and countries consumed now by conflict, or hosting those who have fled it.

That needs to start, as it has for me, by parting with a couple of wrong ideas about the refugee crisis. One is that the Syrian refugees are concentrated in camps. They aren’t. These arid encampments are so huge that it’s hard to fathom that only a small percentage of those refugees actually live in one; in many places, a majority live in the communities of their host countries. In Jordan and Lebanon, for example, most refugees are in urban centers rather than in camps. This is a problem that knows no perimeter.

Another fallacy is that the crisis is temporary. I guess it depends on your definition of “temporary,” but I didn’t meet many refugees, some of whom have been displaced for decades, who felt that they were just passing through. Some families have spent two generations — and some young people their entire lives — as refugees. They have been exiled by their home countries only to face a second exile in the countries that have accepted their presence but not their right to move or to work. You hear the term “permanent temporary solution” thrown around by officials, but not with the irony you’d think it deserves.

Those understandings should shape our response. The United States and other developed nations have a chance to act smarter, think bigger and move faster in addressing this crisis and preventing the next one. Having talked with refugees, and having talked to countless officials and representatives of civil society along the way, I see three areas where the world should act.

First, the refugees, and the countries where they’re living, need more humanitarian support. You see this most vividly in a place like the Dadaab complex in Kenya, near the border of Somalia, a place patched together (or not) with sticks and plastic sheets. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is doing noble and exceedingly hard work. But it can’t do everything it needs to do when it is chronically underfunded by the very governments that expect it to handle this global problem.

Second, we can help host countries see refugees not just as a burden, but as a benefit. The international community could be doing much more, through development assistance and trade deals, to encourage businesses and states hosting refugees to see the upside of people’s hands being occupied and not idle (the World Bank and the Scriptures agree on this). The refugees want to work. They were shopkeepers, teachers and musicians at home, and want to be these things again, or maybe become new things — if they can get education, training and access to the labor market.

In other words, they need development. Development that invests in them and empowers them — that treats them not as passive recipients but as leaders and partners. The world tends to give humanitarian efforts and development efforts their own separate bureaucracies and unlisted phone numbers, as if they’re wholly separate concerns. But to be effective they need to be better coordinated; we have to link the two and fund them both. Refugees living in camps need food and shelter right away, but they also need the long-term benefits of education, training, jobs and financial security.

Third, the world needs to shore up the development assistance it gives to those countries that have not collapsed but are racked by conflict, corruption and weak governance. These countries may yet spiral into anarchy. Lately some Western governments have been cutting overseas aid to spend money instead on asylum-seekers within their borders. But it is less expensive to invest in stability than to confront instability. Transparency, respect for rule of law, and a free and independent media are also crucial to the survival of countries on the periphery of chaos. Because chaos, as we know all too well, is contagious.

‎Bono‬, in an art gallery led by refugees, in the refugee camp in Zaatari, Jordan.

What we don’t want and can’t afford is to have important countries in the Sahel, the band of countries just south of the Sahara, going the same way as Syria. If Nigeria, a country many times larger than Syria, were to fracture as a result of groups like Boko Haram, we are going to wish we had been thinking bigger before the storm.

Actually, some people are thinking bigger. I keep hearing calls from a real gathering of forces — Africans and Europeans, army generals and World Bank and International Monetary Fund officials — to emulate that most genius of American ideas, the Marshall Plan. That plan delivered trade and development in service of security — in places where institutions were broken and hope had been lost. Well, hope is not lost in the Middle East and North Africa, not yet, not even where it’s held together by string. But hope is getting impatient. We should be, too.

UPDATE:

Bono Opening Statement Senate. Foreign Aid Isn't Charity Its National Security Foreign Assistance and Violent Extremism U2 lead singer and activist Bono and United Nations and military officials testified at a hearing on the role of foreign assistance in combating violent extremism worldwide.

http://www.nytimes.com/

Bono's mission to end extreme poverty

CNN talks exclusively with Bono in Lagos, Nigeria to discuss his mission to end extreme poverty. New Day's Michaela Pereira reports.

U2 Shows to Help Build the Nelson Mandela Children's Hospital

U2 has thrown its support behind the Legacy of Hope Foundation, a nonprofit organization aiding to bring one of Nelson Mandela's final wishes to fruition - the construction of the 5th dedicated children's hospital on the entire continent of Africa. The Nelson Mandela Children's Hospital will provide access to high-quality medical care for the children of Southern Africa, regardless of their ability to pay. This facility will have a profound, transformative effect on healthcare in the region. All members of U2, including Bono, a longtime ally and friend of Mr. Mandela and supporter of his charitable efforts, signed one of the Edge's acoustic guitars for Legacy of Hope. Bono, who was recently injured during a cycling accident in New York City, has been recuperating following surgery, but nevertheless still wanted to show his support. Prolific rock star Bono tagged the guitar with the inscription, "There's no them there's only us!"

When reached for comment, Eric Gast, CEO/Executive Producer of the Legacy of Hope Foundation, stated "We are truly honored that U2 would show their support with this wonderful gesture and I'm moved that Bono, in his current state, would have the resolve to help support Mr. Mandela's dream of free and accessible healthcare for the children of Southern Africa."

The Legacy of Hope Foundation has garnered the support of numerous artists, celebrities and distinguished civil rights leaders, some of whom serve on its Honorary Board, including Ruby Bridges, Christy Turlington Burns, Ed Burns, Viola Davis, Dame Judi Dench, Arun Gandhi, Whoopi Goldberg, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Katherine Heigl, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Ashley Judd, Nicole Kidman, Larry King, Sir Ben Kingsley, Salma Hayek Pinault, Natalie Portman, Susan Sarandon, Octavia Spencer, Charlize Theron, Ben Vereen, Barbara Walters, Elie and Marion Wiesel, Her Highness Princess Dalal Al-Saud, and the late Dr. Maya Angelou.

For more information, please visit http://www.legacyofhope.org

The Edge showed his support for the Belvedere two-day sleep-out in Dublin in aid of the homeless

The guitarist surprised the students of Belvedere College by presenting a cheque to them on the 31st Annual Belvedere College Sleepout.

The students started the sleep-out yesterday and will finish tomorrow on Dublin's O'Connell street and College Green.

The amount of money donated by The Edge remains undisclosed.The star  has been enjoying some down time in Dublin ahead of Christmas.

Keith Duffy's son Jay, a budding actor, has been sleeping out at the GPO with the schoolboys to raise funds.Jay has been using his celebrity connections to raise awareness.

Kodaline, Ryan Tubridy, Gay Byrne and Brendan Gleeson all showed their support for the sleep-out.One Direction's Niall Horan tweeted his support, causing the site to crash temporarily.

The boys are hoping to beat last year's record and raise over €143k for Focus Ireland, the Peter McVerry Trust and Home Again.

To donate online, see www.sleepoutdublin.ie

Sing Bono's Band Aid 30 Lyrics to Help Fight Ebola

The organizers behind Band Aid 30 – the latest incarnation of Bob Geldof's charitably minded supergroup Band Aid – have issued an "Ice Bucket Challenge"–style viral video call to action to music fans. Using a free iOS app called WholeWorldBand, Band Aid 30 would like people to record themselves singing Bono's "Do They Know It's Christmas?" line, "Tonight we're reaching out and touching you," and then nominate three friends to do the same on social media. The U2 frontman delivers the line at the 1:52 mark in the song's official video.

The app allows users to create a video mix of themselves and up to five other people singing along with the song, which can be uploaded to YouTube, Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #BandAid30. The organization will collect £1.40 (about $2.20) for every person who participates in the challenge and put it toward the fight against Ebola in West Africa.

"We need to keep up momentum," Geldof said in a statement. "I want us to raise about £5 million but we need people to understand that we've only got three weeks to make a difference."

Geldof and "Do They Know It's Christmas?" co-writer Midge Ure released a new version of the iconic 1984 hit, under the Band Aid 30 moniker, last month. In addition to Bono, the new version also features Coldplay's Chris Martin, One Direction, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith, Ellie Goulding, Angelique Kidjo, Seal, Sinéad O'Connor and many more artists performing the tune.

Ure recently spoke with Rolling Stone about why they decided to resurrect Band Aid. "It was the hideous synchronicity of the Ebola crisis and the way it's escalated, and the fact that we had this 30th anniversary coming up that everybody was asking us about," he said. "A month ago, this wasn't in the cards. Then Bob got a call from the U.N. saying, 'Can you do it again?'"

Regarding introducing a new generation to the song, Ure contended that they already knew it "because they've heard it blasting out of radios every Christmas since they were born." The hard part would be getting them involved in the charitable side of the cause. "All we can do is hope that Ed Sheeran and One Direction and everyone else plead with the fans not to stream this, not to download this for free," he said.



 http://www.rollingstone.com

World's AIDS Day

It’s World AIDS Day. Share this video and  (RED)  will donate to help get one step closer to ending AIDS.#onestep4RED

Post by Bank of America.

Bono's Mercury Phoenix Trust Message:

"Do They Know It's Christmas?" 2014 Version

Bono is one of a couple dozen artists to gather this weekend in London to record as Band Aid 30 for an updated version of "Do They Know It's Christmas?"

This version of the song is a fund raiser to help fight the Ebola outbreak in Africa. The song should be available on iTunes and other online stores tomorrow/Tuesday, and a physical CD is due to be available in a few weeks.

The music video of this year's "Do They Know It's Christmas?" premiered Sunday night on the UK version of The X Factor.

Walk In My Shoes Day

Adam joined Irish celebrities Alison Canavan, Brent Pope and The Original Rude Boys for the Dublin launch  of next week's Walk In My Shoes day.

Inspired by a 16year old at St. Patrick’s University Hospital, who wished his friends could ‘walk in his shoes’ to understand what he was going through, Walk in My Shoes raises funds to provide mental health support, information and services to vulnerable young adults in Ireland.

'We need support growing up, but especially if you’re vulnerable and you need someone to talk to,' explained Adam, patron of the organisation. 'It’s ok to ask for help and Walk In My Shoes is working hard to remove the stigma around mental health difficulties. I hope everyone will join in on 9th May for Walk In My Shoes day and step out in stylish or mismatched shoes - let’s make a real difference.'

Adam Clayton was one of Ryan Tubridy's guests on  The Late Late Show on RTE-TV.You can watch the whole show for the next three weeks on RTE's website.

UPDATE:  Adam Clayton on Ireland AM - TV3 -

http://www.independent.ie/www.u2.com//http://www.walkinmyshoes.ie//http://www.rte.ie/

Adam Clayton "The Album Could Be Finished by the Summer"

Adam Clayton talked on the phone on the Ray Foley show. The interview was about his involvement with the campaing "Walk in my Shoes" (a campaign to raise mental health awareness of the St. Patrick's Mental Health Foundation in Dublin). Before even started,Adam explained:

"I'm just back from doing some recordings. I think there's a lot of recording going on but we're coming to an end which is good."


Ray: "Is it for the new album?"

Adam: "Yeah, you know, I can't say when   we're gonna be releasing it, but I can say we hope to have it finished before the end of the summer, which will be great...and we're very excited about it, and we all want to get it out as quickly as possible but I don't want to  pre-empt anything until I know it's actually finished..."





http://www.walkinmyshoes.ie//http://news.u2fanlife.com//https://soundcloud.com/rayfoleyshow/adam-clayton-interview-on-the-ray-foley-show

Milestone For Music Rising

Milestone for Music Rising

Edge spoke by video (below) at the launch of a 'Music Rising' initiative at Tulane University, New Orleans, on Wednesday.

'Music Rising At Tulane' is a specialist website focusing on the musical cultures of the Gulf South. It features original content, artists’ biographies, K-12 learning modules and a state-of-the-art music instructional program. The School’s New Orleans Center for the Gulf South is providing lectures and symposia to scholars and the public. Classes such as the Trombone Shorty Academy are 'breaking down the walls between classroom and community, creating unmatched opportunities for the exchange of ideas and experience.'

'It's a remarkable milestone for Music Rising,' says Edge, who co-founded the organisation with music producer Bob Ezrin after Hurricane Katrina tore through the Gulf Coast in 2005. 'Out of this partnership we were able to create a program which fosters national and international study through the work of K-12 educators and university scholars. 
'I hope that this is only the beginning of an opportunity to provide future generations of students a chance to experience the colorful and dynamic musical history from this very special part of the world. On behalf of myself and our entire Music Rising team I extend my heartfelt thanks to everyone who helped make this happen.'

Along with performances by local artists, Wednesday's launch - billed as a 'Musical Cultures Jam' - was a chance to explore the new site, a one-stop shop for music of every genre from blues, rock, zydeco and jazz to the rhythms of Congo Square and the Second Line tradition.  

Music Rising was originally set up to support the restoration and preservation of New Orleans’ unique musical traditions. Since 2005 it's become a national disaster relief fund for music education and supplied aid to thousands of music students, professional musicians and church members.  More on Music Rising at Tulane here. 





http://www.u2.com/

Larry Mullen Jr, legendary drummer in world famous rock ‘n’ roll band U2 supports Street Child World Cup and the World’s Largest Samba Band at the Royal Albert Hall.

“When I was a kid in the 70s growing up in Artane Dublin, Pele was my hero. When I slept I dreamt of being a full forward, being up front, the striker. When I woke up I was the goal keeper for a rock ‘n’ roll band.

Never stop dreaming.

Now go break that Samba World Record – and best of luck for the Street Child World Cup.

No child should ever have to live on the streets.” Larry Mullen Jr, U2

On Monday, 1500 school children will take over the iconic Royal Albert Hall to break the World Record for the World’s Largest Samba Band and bang the drum for street children’s rights.

The event marks the UK launch of the second Street Child World Cup, kicking off in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on March 28. 19 countries of street children, girls and boys, will come together to play football and take part in an international conference championing the rights of street children.


This is more than a game.


You can help bang the drum for street children’s rights by texting SCWC14 and the £ amount to 70070 and make a difference today.

http://streetchildworldcup.org/

"Invisible": Official Video

'Invisible'. The Video
The official video for 'Invisible', directed by Mark Romanek. 

Shot in black and white, in a Santa Monica airport hangar, with an audience of 1200. 

A sixty second clip from the video, premiered on February 2nd during the Super Bowl, launched a partnership with (RED) and Bank of America in the fight against AIDS. 

In 36 hours downloads of #U2Invisible raised more than $3m.  On iTunes all proceeds from 'Invisible'  continue to go to (RED) for the Global Fund.  Download here.

http://www.u2.com/

Bono: "Mandela was a lesson in humility"

Bono in an interview with Anderson Cooper describes Nelson Mandela as a “lesson in humility”.

He also talks about Archbishop Desmond Tutu, “The Arch”.




http://www.youtube.com/user/CNNInternational

'Beethoven With A Backbeat'

'Beethoven with a backbeat... the true disciple of Sir Duke... who raises our hopes when he raises his voice... the man with an understatement for a last name... and here he is...Stevie Wonder.'

In New York at the Global Citizen Festival, which featured Kings of Leon, Alicia Keys and John Meyer,  Bono was up on stage  to salute Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and then back onstage to welcome 'the master blaster'.

Jordan Hewson, Bono and Ali's eldest daughter, is an active member of Global Citizen. 

http://www.u2.com

Bono: 'There's a difference between cosying up to power and being close to power'

Interviewed during a trip to west Africa, campaigner and U2 frontman Bono talks about what drives his activism and responds frankly to criticism of aid to Africa, his relationship with politicians and his group's controversial tax arrangements

Bono in Ghana: 'I just thought: I’ll do what I can. And I will talk to anybody.' Photograph: Jonx Pillemer/ (RED)

For a week at the end of August Bono was travelling in west Africa, leading an invited group that included Condoleezza Rice, five Republican senators, corporate leaders from companies involved in the RED campaign (which donates money to the Global Fund to fight HIV/Aids), and artists including the LA dubstep pioneer Skrillex. The U2 singer was on what is a regular fact-finding mission – visiting hospitals, civil society organisations, politicians and young entrepreneurs – and introducing his eclectic tour party to some of the issues that his campaigning group ONE.org tries to keep at the forefront of global leaders' minds. Having spent the first half of the tour in Liberia, he was in the Ghanaian capital Accra when this interview took place. A couple of nights earlier at a downtown bar, I'd watched him give an impromptu performance of Stand By Me with the house band. That morning we had met local advocates for the agenda of transparency – both for governance and business in Ghana. During that meeting Bono had heard the news of the death of his friend Seamus Heaney, so we talked first about that, before broadening the discussion to his 25 years as an activist for African development, the lessons he has learned and those he is still learning.

First of all I should say how sorry I was to hear of Seamus's death, I know the two of you were long-standing friends…

You may not know that to every meeting I have ever had since I began full-time advocacy I have brought with me a book of Seamus Heaney's poems. I always think if you are asking somebody for something it is a good idea to give them something first. So I always give them Seamus's poems. This is from the pope to every president I have ever met. In this last week I gave Seamus's book Electric Light to President Johnson Sirleaf in Liberia. She is currently obsessed with the efforts to bring electricity to her people, so she could not believe it…

He was a fellow traveller?

Literally so. Seamus has been with me on every journey I have taken and there have been many times when a retreat into his words has kept me afloat. Most of our life in this kind of work is very concrete, full of facts, but we all have to seek redress from time to time in poetry. Seamus was where I went for that. He was the quietest storm that ever blew into town. "From the Republic of Conscience" has been like a Bible for me as an activist, something I have returned to for as long as I can remember. Some of those phrases are like tattoos for me, worn very close to the heart.

It's interesting to hear you make that distinction between the rigour of the arguments you have to put across, and the need for empathy. In a recent TED talk you presented yourself as the "factivist", the nerd who is aroused by the statistics of development, but for all the data there also has to be an emotional engagement for any of this to work?

I think that is why artists are useful in our kind of campaign. As a musician and a songwriter it is an act of the ego to believe that other people might be interested in your point of view. But it is usually an empathetic nature that gets you going in the first place. Music keeps the heart porous in many ways.

Yesterday you were mentioning the former "slave castle" at Elmina on the coast that you visited with some of your group. That seemed quite an emotional journey for all concerned.

Bono at the 'door of no return' at Elmina Castle, Ghana. Photograph: Jonx Pillemer/(RED)

It was. And I wasn't expecting it to be. I didn't want to go. I thought I was here with a different agenda. But fate and a really hard-headed tour manager had us there and that obvious thing came home to me full force: that you can't begin to understand this continent without first understanding slavery. As ever the data is not super-sound, but it seems likely that 300 million lives were taken in three centuries. Only a third of those people survived. Hundreds of years of deliberate destruction of the fabric of African life, and the fabric of African families. I had never really confronted those facts in that way. And the guide we had there wasn't letting us off the hook at all. You know, someone said something about "Arab traders", but he came straight back: no, it was always the Europeans who were the cruellest, the worst. They were the drivers of it.

You suggested one of your inspirations as a campaigner was Josiah Wedgwood, and his inclusion of the slogan "Am I not a man and a brother?" in his pottery, which galvanised the abolition movement. Do you see him as a kindred spirit?

It was a kind of blueprint for what we are trying to do, certainly. The way they organised themselves, a lot of artists and writers involved – using slogans, including on bracelets I think. And like us they refused to hold their campaign hostage to a particular ideology. The abolitionists worked not from one political side or another but worked to find a radical centre. That is what we were thinking of when we called this the ONE campaign. That's why we work so hard in involving conservative opinion in it – everyone from religious conservatives to fiscal conservatives – which has made us unpopular with some people. That is also why we try to torture the left over protectionism in Europe as it affects farmers here. We try to be both popular and unpopular with everyone. And the abolitionists were a great model for that. Lincoln, of course, was a republican…

Bono, US Senator Lindsey Graham and Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf at a reception in Monrovia. Photograph: Jonx Pillemer/(RED)

Bono will attend next week's Global Citizen Festival to help fight poverty.

NEW YORK — U2 frontman Bono and a long list of world leaders will attend next week's Global Citizen Festival to help fight poverty.

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, leaders from several countries and congressional members will join Stevie Wonder, Kings of Leon, Alicia Keys and John Mayer at the free concert Sept. 28 in New York's Central Park. The concert coincides with the U.N. General Assembly. Fans earn free tickets for helping spread the word or volunteering to help end world poverty.

Bono will present Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf with a Global Citizen Movement Award for her work on women's equality.

Crown Princess Mary of Denmark, Malaysia Prime Minister Najib Razak and U.S. Congress members Earl Blumenauer, Charlie Dent and Kay Granger also are expected to attend.

http://online.wsj.com
http://festival.globalcitizen.org/

Bono in Ghana

Bono is still in Africa but this time he`s in Ghana. He`s visited the Meltwater enterpreneurial school of technology.

There was some fun too...

At the 233 Jazz Bar in Accra, Ghana

Bono, lead singer of U2 and co-founder of The ONE Campaign and (RED), met with Ghanaian entrepreneurs to hear how technology is transforming Ghana and discussed ways in which digital innovation can spur economic development and increase transparency in health, agriculture and government services.

Approximately 70 people joined the session at the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST), including internationally renowned Ghanaian business leaders and entrepreneurs such as Bright Simons of mPedigree, Edward Amartey-Tagoe of Nandimobile and Eyram Tawia of Leti Games.

Bono was joined at the visit by a diverse delegation of leaders from the international policymaking, business and creative communities who are traveling with him in Ghana as part of a ONE/(RED) listening and learning trip to the region.

Bono said: "Technology can play a huge part in eradicating extreme poverty. As well as building thriving businesses, it can be used to battle corruption by helping citizens hold corporations and governments to account. Transparency is the best vaccine against corruption, and harnessing the talent of these tech-savvy innovators could dramatically change the game against those trying to game the system."

Bono and ONE have been working over the past few years with African partners on the fight for greater transparency and accountability in development, with a focus on increasing transparency in the extractives industry, and on how to increase international investment in Africa.

The group at Meltwater also discussed how technology can serve as a tool to ensure grassroots voices are heard as the future of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are discussed. The MDGs, created by former UN secretary general, Ghanaian Kofi Anan and adopted in 2000, are a set of globally-agreed development goals that aim to halve extreme poverty and hunger and massively reduce disease by 2015. As that deadline approaches, world leaders are debating what should follow. It is important that the voices of the citizens in developing nations are heard in this process. ONE's 'You Choose' campaign used mobile technology to ask people in South Africa, Zambia and Malawi what their priorities are for the future.

Jorn Lyseggen, Founder and CEO of Meltwater and MEST, added that "MEST was started on the fundamental belief that technology entrepreneurship is one Africa's most exciting untapped opportunities. We are proud that Bono and one.org chose MEST as the venue to discuss how tech can help address Africa's challenges'.

Earlier , the group also visited the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital to see the difference being made by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria. (RED), which partners with corporations to drive funding to the Global Fund to fight AIDS in Africa, has generated almost US $215 million for the Global Fund to date.

Prior to arriving in Ghana , the group was in Liberia meeting with local leaders in government, business, healthcare and the energy sector. Bono and members of the ONE / (RED) team met President Sirleaf in Monrovia and President Mahama in Accra.

About MEST: The Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology (MEST) and the MEST Incubator program provide training, investment and mentoring for aspiring software entrepreneurs with the goal of creating globally successful companies that create wealth and jobs locally in Africa.

MEST is based in Accra, Ghana and is fully funded and run by Meltwater Group through the non-profit organization, Meltwater Foundation

Since 2008 MEST has trained over 100 tech entrepreneurs and has invested over $1.5M in 13 tech start-ups in Ghana. MEST companies have raised external capital, competed in top technology events such as TechCrunch Disrupt, DEMO, and the Launch Festival, and have gained admittance to top accelerator programs such as HealthXL and 500 Startups.

http://www.modernghana.com

pics: http://www.u2interference.comhttps://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=659739637369401&set=a.659313860745312.1073741911.246973051979397&type=3&theater

Bono in Liberia with ONE

President Sirleaf, Senator Lindsey Grahan and Bono make statements at Press Stakeout following talks.

Monrovia - President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf met on Monday with high-powered delegations from the United States of America, representing Senators, former senior government officials, business leaders, entertainers and philanthropists.

At a meeting Monday evening at her Foreign Ministry office, President Sirleaf held discussions with six U.S. Senators, Bono, the founder of the ONE Campaign and RED, the CEO of the Coca-Cola Company, and more.

In welcoming the delegation, President Sirleaf said that Liberia owed so much to many of those seated around the table, as she singled out former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, singer Bono and the members of the U.S. Congress present.

According to an Executive Mansion release, the President recalled the measures taken by her administration during the first six years, which she called the period of stabilization, and the plans for the second term, the period of transformation, and cited measures the government is taking., in implementing its Agenda for Transformation, in the areas of peace, security and the rule of law, economic transformation, human development, and more.

Also making comments about their impressions about Liberia were Senators Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), Roy Blunt (R-MO), John Barrasso (R-WY), Mike Johans (R-NE) and John Thune ((R-SD). Former Secretary of State Rice and Bono also spoke, comparing the Liberia today with when they last visited the country.

The CEO of the Coca-Cola Company, Mr. Muhtar Kent, said he had come to Liberia because President Sirleaf had invited him to do so two years ago, when they appeared together at the Clinton Global Initiative.

He spoke of his company’s plans to expand operations in Liberia and introduce new packages, including the production of juices, and spoke of his company’s support for women entrepreneurs who, because of owing their business, they are today able to support their families and send their children to school.

Before the meeting with the two delegations, President Sirleaf held a tête-à-tête with former Secretary Rice. She then met with CEO Kent and other executives of the Coca-Cola Company. At a press stakeout following the meeting, there were statements by President Sirleaf, Senator Graham and Bono.

President Sirleaf expressed a warm welcome to Senator Graham, the other Senators in the delegation, to ONE/RED and Bono. She said that Liberians were happy to receive this delegation, as it was important to let Liberians once again recognize the support that the country has received from the United States. The President said a special welcome to former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, and recalled the role she and Bono had played in Liberia’s debt relief.

The President said that the support Liberia received from the U.S. Congress has enabled the country not only to celebrate ten consecutive years of peace, but also to have made progress in reconstructing the economy, and trying to make sure basic services are delivered to the people.

Senator Graham observed that he has been in Congress almost 20 years, but had never seen a delegation like this one, and he attributed the high-powered delegation to Liberia, the President and the people. He said he had come to Liberia because Bono had told him that Liberia was one country in Africa that he should visit, “because it all comes together here: a struggling people who have lived through incredible difficulty but who are on the rise to a great future.”

For his part, Bono declared that himself to be a great fan of President Sirleaf’s, and he felt as if he’d been working for her, for a while now. “I’m starting to understand this success that’s unfolding here,” he said, but noted the President’s impatience with the pace of this success.

This success, he said, was not only the President’s; he had had met with members of her Cabinet, who are so smart, and so committed. In Liberia, he said, there is this sense of optimism that we can do it. Other countries have taken a more autocratic approach to their post-conflict situation.

Of Liberia, he said, “this is a real democracy; it is a really beautiful thing to see and very difficult to pull off, and everybody has to believe in it. Most people do, and I will continue to work for you.”

Referring to the congressional delegation, Bono pointed out that there are no votes to be gained by them in coming to Liberia. This is not politics as usual. Rather, these are people who, in a way, have a vision of the future.

They see that Africa will probably double the population of China by 2015. Everyone says China is the country of the future; but these people see Africa as the continent of now! They are visionaries, in that sense. They are here because of their hearts and their heads, and I’m so glad to be a part.

President Sirleaf also recognized the CEO of Coca-Cola, Mr. Kent, pointing out that the company has a lot of investment in Liberia and has been with Liberia through thick and then, through the difficult days. Following the press stakeout, President Sirleaf hosted a reception for the delegations.

 http://www.frontpageafricaonline.com/