- Fred Cuny
Frederick C. Cuny (born
November 14 ,1944 inNew Haven ,Connecticut ) was an Americandisaster relief specialist who was active in many humanitarian projects around the world from 1969 until hisforced disappearance inChechnya in 1995.Life and career
In 1952 Cuny moved with his family to
Texas . He had a passion for flying and hoped to become a fighter pilot. He studiedengineering atTexas A&M University , specializing in problems in developing countries, and urban planning at the University of Houston. Unable to pass his language requirements, Cuny could not go on to Officers' Candidate School, thus ending his dream of life as an officer in the military. However, he became increasingly involved in causes such as the problems of localMexican migrant worker s.Cuny became an accomplished
civil engineer , working on large construction projects such as aradar installation atDallas-Fort Worth International Airport . At some point he became dissatisfied and decided to become adisaster relief specialist who used his training in engineering to do humanitarian work. Cuny was hired by organizations such as theUnited Nations and private foundations to design and carry out relief plans. Cuny was able to maintain the autonomy to devise solutions his way and became increasingly active as a policy adviser. Cuny's overriding goal was to institute a radical restructuring of the way the disaster relief system operated throughout the world.Humanitarian work
In 1971 he founded the non-profit Intertect Relief and Reconstruction Corp. of
Dallas , Texas, a relief mission technical assistance and training company. This company became the major disaster relief agency, Interworks. Cuny also founded the Center for the Study of Societies in Crisis which became known as theCuny Center after his death. He worked in countries such asBiafra ,Guatemala ,Ethiopia ,Iraq ,Somalia , and Bosnia. At the end of his life he was working closely withGeorge Soros 'Open Society Institute , and was instrumental in the early stages of founding theInternational Crisis Group , which seeks to institutionalize theknowledge base of relief experts. Cuny was named aMacArthur Fellow in 1995, but disappeared before he could officially receive his award.Disappearance
In
April 1995 , Cuny and his team of twoRussia nRed Cross doctors and an interpreter disappeared inChechnya while seeking to negotiate aceasefire . Cuny's family believes that although they were in contact with the Chechen forces underDzhokhar Dudayev who were meant to pass them on for safe keeping, they were arrested and executed under the orders of Rizvan Elbiev (Elbiyev), a local Chechen rebelcounterintelligence commander. [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cuny/kill/] It is suspected that the Russians, antagonised by Cuny's published criticism of the war, disseminatedpropaganda that Cuny and his team were Russian spies. [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990CE0DE1430F93BA2575BC0A963958260] Their remains were never found.Books
* "Famine, Conflict and Response: A Basic Guide" Frederick C. Cuny, Richard B. Hill, ISBN 1-56549-090-8
* "Disasters and Development" Fredrick C. Cuny, ISBN 0-19-503293-4Media depictions
* "The Man Who Tried to Save the World: The Dangerous Life & Mysterious Disappearance of Fred Cuny", Scott Anderson, ISBN 0-385-48666-9::In 2002
Harrison Ford was working on turning "The Man Who Tried to Save the World" into a movie.* In 1997 the
PBS program "Frontline" profiled Fred Cuny in a one hour show entitled “ [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cuny/ The Lost American] ”.ee also
*
Attacks on humanitarian workers
*Famine relief
*Humanitarian crisis External links
* [http://www.cunycenter.org/ The Cuny Center]
* [http://www.crisisgroup.org/ The International Crisis Group]
* [http://onlineethics.org/moral/cuny/intro.html Fred Cuny profile] - onlineethics center
* [http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/vol18/issue40/books.fredcuny.html The Master of Disaster] - profile atAustin Chronicle
* [http://world.std.com/~jlr/doom/cuny.htm Frederick Cuny, Reliever]
* [http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig3/kwiatkowski3.html Garner's Missing Link] - about Cuny's assistance toJay Garner in northern Iraq after the firstGulf War
* [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cuny/bio/hero.html The New York Review of Books 1995 biography of Cuny.]
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