Names and faces
Oscar-winning actress Cate Blanchett said that nothing prepared her for “the extent and depth of suffering” she saw when she visited camps in Bangladesh for Rohingya Muslim refugees who fled a violent crackdown by Burma’s military. In her very different role as a goodwill ambassador for the U.N. refugee agency, Blanchett told a U.N. Security Council meeting Tuesday that she heard “gut-wrenching accounts” of torture, rape and people seeing loved ones killed before their eyes. “I am a mother, and I saw my children in the eyes of every single refugee child I met,” the two-time Academy Award winner said. “I saw myself in every parent. How can any mother endure seeing her child thrown into a fire.” The Rohingya have long been treated as outsiders in Buddhist-majority Burma, even though their families have lived in the country for generations. Nearly all have been denied citizenship since 1982, effectively rendering them stateless, and they are also denied freedom of movement and other basic rights. The Security Council meeting on Tuesday commemorated the first anniversary of a violent crackdown by Burma’s military that began a year ago, leading about 700,000 Rohingya to flee to neighboring Bangladesh. The Australian actress urged support for the refugees and she implored the Security Council to help the Rohingya return with “a clear pathway to full citizenship.” “We have failed the Rohingya before,” Blanchett said. “Please, let us not fail them again.”
As he dealt with the death of his mother and 12-year-old sister in an Aug. 23 car crash in San Diego, Calif., Angelo Pizarro tweeted at, of all people, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Angelo’s mom was a huge fan, and Pizarro thought that if the celebrity would just say her name — Aileen Pizarro — it would bring a small amount of relief to the shock and unrelenting sorrow. Within a day, the tweet was retweeted tens of thousands of times, with the plea reaching its intended target. Soon, Johnson recorded a video saying Aileen Pizarro’s name, offering “love and light” and even appearing to get emotional at the thought of the tragedy affecting people he did not know. “From what I’m told, your mom was a very, very big fan of mine, so anyway, man, I am sending so much love and light and strength your way from my family to yours, and I just want to say thanks for reaching out, man, and I’m so sorry to hear about your sister and your mom and this tragic loss you and your family are going through,” The Rock says in the video. He wipes his eye and continues: “If your mom can see me now, which I’m sure she can, I just want to thank her for all the love and for being such a big fan.”