The stories of myths and legends have been around since the dawn of time. World Humanitarian Day is a campaign by OCHA, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. According to the UN World Health Organization (WHO), there were 1,009 attacks against health-care workers and facilities, which claimed 199 lives and left another 628 wounded.
They heed distant cries for help and support women and girls in need. Read more below for more tales of heroic humanitarians: In English En Français Get the latest news from your inbox for free. Humanitarians didn’t appear in those stories, but this year we bring these unsung heroic stories to life. The horrific images from Beirut are a constant reminder that humanitarian assistance must remain at the core of our global response mechanisms, said Mr. Muhammad-Bande. We honour counsellors and caseworkers providing support to survivors of gender-based violence, which has worsened under COVID-19. As we give recognition to local real-life heroes, we also need to protect and keep them free from harassment, threats, intimidation and violence.
In recent weeks, relief workers lost their lives in attacks in Niger and Cameroon, and since the onset of the pandemic, scores of health workers have come under attack across the world, said the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in a news release on Wednesday.
UN salutes real-life heroes doing ‘extraordinary things, in extraordinary times’ When disasters strike, they are ‘the first to respond and the last to leave’ 19 August 2020
This comes against the backdrop of rising violence against aid and health workers around the globe.
Since 2003, some 4,961 humanitarians around the world have been killed, wounded or abducted while carrying out their life-saving duties. They are definitely super human. The stories don’t end here. Most attacks occurred in Syria, followed by South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Afghanistan and the Central African Republic. Despite this surge in violence and disease, these real-life humanitarian heroes are undeterred. She now works with the International Rescue Committee (IRC) to provide women’s health services for Venezuelan migrants and refugees coming into Colombia.
Through years of responding to various emergencies and capitalizing on national expertise and capacity, the humanitarian community in the country has embraced a truly localized approach by recognizing what at-risk communities themselves can do in these challenging times. Here are the stories of some of those inspiring heroes.
On 19 August 2003, a suicide bomber drove a truck full of explosives to the United Nations headquarters in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, Iraq, and blew it up, killing 22 people – among them Sergio Vieira de Mello, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the head of the UN mission in Iraq. In addition, a surge in attacks against health workers was recorded in 2019, including strikes against medics in Syria and shootings of Ebola workers in the DRC.