Inside Geneva: August is for humanitarians

August marks two important days in the humanitarian calendar: the day of the disappeared and World Humanitarian Day.

Fabrizio Carboni, International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC): “I look at my kids, I look at my brothers, I look at my family, and I say ‘imagine now there is a frontline between us and my son, my brother, my mother, my father, are captured and I can’t see them for a year, two, three, four.’’

Inside Geneva hears how the ICRC reunites those divided by conflict and visits the Red Cross Central Tracing Agency.

Anastasia Kushleyko, Central Tracing Agency: “I’m calling from the ICRC, I’m calling from Geneva: As of last week he was a POW, he was safe and well. It’s always always (that) people are so grateful and mothers, you know especially mothers.’’

And on August 30th, the UN marks World Humanitarian Day. Twenty years after the Baghdad bombing which killed 22 UN staff, Inside Geneva talks to an aid worker deeply affected by that day.

Laura Dolci, UN Human Rights: “So I had taken him to the airport, together with our child, and yes it took me in fact many years to be able to use the same elevator in the airport where I last kissed him.’’

She adds that “the aid worker, the humanitarian worker, the peacekeeper; ultimately it’s a human being that decides to put its own being also to the service of humanity.’’

Join Imogen Foulkes on the Inside Geneva podcast to find out more. 

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