When some parts of the Middle East are busy fighting on religious, political or ethnic grounds, humanitarian and charity organisations keep themselves busy with improving the quality of life for millions of deprived and disadvantaged persons. The poor, the disabled, the traumatised and the war victims in millions have been the main concern of thousands of local and international charity organisations.
The Red Cross has declared the situation in Syria a civil war. "We are now talking about a non-international armed conflict in the country," ICRC s...
A lot has been written about the human catastrophe currently unfolding in Syria, horrific photos assail us daily, politicians drop sound-bites condemning the violence, but in a few heart-felt sentences the injured photographer Paul Conroy eloquently and dramatically cut through it all. "It's not a war," he insisted. "It's a massacre." Speaking from the safety of his hospital bed in London, having been smuggled from Homs to Lebanon earlier in the week by Syrian rebels, Conroy pleaded with the world to act now or regret forever the atrocities being committed...
As I type this, the British government has just pledged to financially support the International Committee of the Red Cross as it steps up essential help for those injured during Libya's week of conflict, with aid for up to 5,000 wounded, along with food and household essentials for another 690,000. The announcement comes as a quiet reminder that in amongst the headline-grabbing images of rebels waltzing their way round Gaddafi's glitzy mansion, this uprising, like the others that preceded it across the Middle East and Africa this year, this has not been a conflict without horrific casualties.