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UNHCR to remember sacrifice of colleagues on World Humanitarian Day

News Stories, 18 August 2009

© UNHCR/B.Alaj
At work in the world's danger zones: A UNHCR staffer interviews women who had just fled fighting earlier this year in the dying days of Sri Lanka's civil war.

GENEVA, Switzerland, August 18 (UNHCR) – UNHCR staff will join colleagues from other UN and non-governmental organizations on Wednesday in observing the first World Humanitarian Day, honouring those who have been injured or killed while carrying out their humanitarian work.

The day, which is also Staff Memorial Day, was established by the UN General Assembly last December and is especially poignant for UNHCR, which lost three members of staff to attacks this year in Pakistan. They were among 30 UNHCR staff members killed while performing their duties since 1987.

The date commemorates the specific day in 2003 on which the UN office in Iraq was bombed, killing 22 people including Sergio Vieira de Mello, a UNHCR veteran who was UN High commissioner for Human Rights and a Special Representative to the UN secretary general at the time.

"How do we meet the life-or-death needs of the world's most vulnerable people while making sure those who provide that help are kept safe?" High Commissioner António Guterres wrote in a newspaper article this month. "Our ability to assist those who need it most is being severely tested by the shrinkage of the so-called 'humanitarian space' in which we must work. The nature of conflict is changing, with a multiplicity of armed groups -- some of whom view humanitarians as legitimate targets."

How do we meet the life-or-death needs of the world's most vulnerable people while making sure those who provide that help are kept safe?

High Commissioner António Guterres

Among the events marking the day, Mr. Guterres will speak along with the Staff Council at a ceremony for staff in the Geneva headquarters. Later he will speak at a commemorative event in Geneva's Parc des Bastions organized by OCHA and the Sergio Vieira de Mello Foundation.

Last year 260 humanitarian aid workers were killed, kidnapped or seriously injured in attacks, the highest yearly toll on record. The average number of attacks in the last three years has been three times the level of the previous nine years.

In February of 2009, veteran UNHCR driver Syed Hashim was shot dead in Pakistan during the kidnapping of John Solecki, the head of our Quetta sub-office on 2 February. Mr. Solecki was released in April after two months in captivity.

In June, Aleksandar Vorkapic, a UNHCR staff member on emergency duty helping Pakistanis displaced by fighting in North West Frontier Province died in the bombing of the Pearl Continental hotel in Peshawar. And in July, UNHCR senior field assistant Zill-e-Usman was gunned down in a camp for internally displaced Pakistanis in Peshawar by unknown assailants.

With operations in some of the world's most dangerous locations, the killings have prompted a thorough review of UNHCR security procedures. UNHCR Deputy High Commissioner L. Craig Johnstone is in Pakistan talking to staff and local officials about the security situation this week.

"With the evolving nature of armed conflict and the changing attitudes of some belligerents, the deliberate targeting of humanitarian workers has increased, establishing a tension -- and in some situations a contradiction -- between the imperatives of staff safety and humanitarian action," said Mr. Guterres.

"UNHCR has continuously struggled to determine the 'acceptable' level of security risk to which its staff members can be exposed," he said. "As this month's commemoration demonstrates, it is a truly terrible dilemma."

Despite those risks – which have taken the lives of more than 700 humanitarian workers over the last decade – the staff of UNHCR and similar organizations continue to help those in need around the world. World Humanitarian Day is an opportunity both to remember those who have been killed or injured and to honour those continuing to carry out their humanitarian work despite the danger.

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August 2010

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With elections scheduled in October, 2004 is a crucial year for the future of Afghanistan, and Afghans are returning to their homeland in record numbers. In the first seven months of 2004 alone, more than half a million returned from exile. In all, more than 3.6 million Afghans have returned since UNHCR's voluntary repatriation programme started in 2002.

The UN refugee agency and its partner organisations are working hard to help the returnees rebuild their lives in Afghanistan. Returnees receive a grant to cover basic needs, as well as access to medical facilities, immunisations and landmine awareness training.

UNHCR's housing programme provides tool kits and building supplies for families to build new homes where old ones have been destroyed. The agency also supports the rehabilitation of public buildings as well as programmes to rehabilitate the water supply, vocational training and cash-for-work projects.

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The cycle of life has started again in Afghanistan as returnees put their shoulders to the wheel to rebuild their war-torn country.

Return is only the first step on Afghanistan's long road to recovery. UNHCR is helping returnees settle back home with repatriation packages, shelter kits, mine-awareness training and vaccination against diseases. Slowly but surely, Afghans across the land are reuniting with loved ones, reconstructing homes, going back to school and resuming work. A new phase in their lives has begun.

Watch the process of return, reintegration, rehabilitation and reconstruction unfold in Afghanistan through this gallery.

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Although landless returnees are eligible for the Afghan government's land allocation scheme, demand far outstrips supply. By the end of 2007, the authorities were developing 14 settlements countrywide. Nearly 300,000 returnee families had applied for land, out of which 61,000 had been selected and 3,400 families had actually moved into the settlements.

Desperate returnees sometimes have to camp in open areas or squat in abandoned buildings. Others occupy disputed land where aid agencies are not allowed to build permanent structures such as wells or schools.

One resilient community planted itself in a desert area called Tangi in eastern Afghanistan. With help from the Afghan private sector and the international community, water, homes, mosques and other facilities have sprouted – proof that the right investment and commitment can turn barren land into the good earth.

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