Why humanitarian aid workers are under attack

Military attacks against humanitarian workers and facilities have repeatedly been in the news in the past months; from Afghanistan, to Syria, to South Sudan, among others. This highlights a worrisome trend: the rise in the deliberate targeting of humanitarian workers.

In 2000 there were roughly 91 registered cases of personnel being injured, killed or kidnapped. That number has more than quadrupled ever since—an increase that cannot be explained simply by pointing out the rise in the total numbers of personnel employed in the humanitarian field.

There is no denying that working in war zones and in fragile or unstable post-war societies carries significant risk. Yet the growing trend of attacks against humanitarian professionals should not be downplayed as occupational hazards of a dangerous job. Rather, the increasing risks and attacks against humanitarian professionals should be seen as symptoms of the larger malaise of the international humanitarian sector as a whole.

Put simply, workers on the ground, both local and foreign, are increasingly targeted because of who they are and what they have come to do. This reveals something disturbing: the gradual erosion of the “humanitarian space”—the perhaps fictional yet vital notion of a “safe space” that should allow those providing emergency assistance and relief to operate amid ongoing conflicts.

What could account for this worrisome trend? The reasons are numerous and complex, but perhaps it worth reflecting on at least three important points:
First, when warring parties fight over controlling the civilian population and are deeply committed to destroying and denying their enemies’ ability to govern and maintain territorial control, granting and withholding humanitarian access and assistance become de facto weapons.
Second, these trends at play on the battlefield are reinforced time and time again when they are met with impunity and, at times, complacency from the international community.
Finally, it is important to reflect on how the legacy of the past decade of external military interventions, followed by counter-insurgency campaigns, “state-building” processes, “stabilization” operations and “civil-military partnerships” has at times dangerously muddled up the lines between principled and neutral humanitarian work and politics.

If the “humanitarian safe space” is not preserved and protected, providing assistance will become more difficult. This could have devastating consequences for the international humanitarian system as a whole and, more importantly, for the millions of civilians trapped in conflict-zones and dependent on humanitarian assistance.

[Dr Benedetta Berti, a fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies, writing in The National Interest]

Why is no one punished for attacks on aid workers?

There are rules during wartime, and the rules are simple: Don’t target medical facilities. Don’t harm doctors and medical workers. Don’t harm civilians, including aid workers. They’re outlined in a raft of domestic and international laws. This includes the Geneva Conventions, a treaty ratified by 196 nations after World War II, and several U.N. Security Council and U.N. Human Rights Council resolutions.

Yet aid workers are operating in environments that are increasingly hostile to them, says Anaïde L. Nahikian, who runs Harvard’s Advanced Training Program on Humanitarian Action. In October 2015, U.S. planes bombed a Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, killing 42. In July, South Sudanese soldiers brutally gang-raped foreign aid workers. And the number of reported kidnappings of aid workers each year quadrupled to 121 from 2002 to 2014.

In the past few years, almost no one has been arrested or jailed for these atrocities or prosecuted at the International Criminal Court or ad hoc U.N. tribunals. The message to violators is that they can act with impunity, says Patricia McIlreavy, vice president of humanitarian policy at InterAction, a coalition of global NGOs. “I don’t know of any punishments that have been meted out,” she says.

“Warring parties today have a license to kill — without consequences or accountability for their actions,” says Shannon Scribner, associate director of humanitarian programs and policy at Oxfam America. “[The world’s] standards no longer carry much weight.”

[NPR]

International aid organizations call for humanitarian corridor in Aleppo

Leading international humanitarian organizations called for the opening of secure corridors in Aleppo in order to evacuate the many wounded civilians in the city’s opposition-held eastern districts.

The World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) have stressed that the sick and wounded should be moved from Aleppo to safe zones where they can receive urgent medical care.

Tarik Jasarevic, spokesman for the WHO, stated that his organization had made a medical evacuation request to the Syrian health authorities in order to facilitate the provision of medical aid either in regime-held western Aleppo or in medical facilities close to nearby Idlib.

Speaking for the ICRC, Krista Armstrong confirmed that their medical teams have been working tirelessly in eastern Aleppo to save lives, but that they lack the ability and facilities to address emergency and specialist cases.

According to the WHO, only 35 doctors remain in eastern Aleppo despite an urgent need for medical professionals. Aleppo’s medical facilities are stretched to their limits.

[Middle East Monitor]

Humanitarian workers in Syria face intense danger

The heinous attack against a UN humanitarian aid convoy near Aleppo shocked the world. It is a sad manifestation of the great danger humanitarian workers are facing in Syria today.

Humanitarian workers are facing intense danger, risking their lives to save others. “In Syria today, carrying humanitarian aid puts you in greater danger than carrying a weapon,” according to one aid worker.

Humanitarian aid outside the supervision of the government has been forbidden in Syria since 2012, as all aid is channeled through the Syrian Arab Red Crescent and other agencies registered with the Syrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Thus, the work of grassroots humanitarian groups and NGOs working in opposition-controlled areas is effectively criminalized. People delivering humanitarian assistance face the danger of being put on trial before a military tribunal for “funding terrorist activities”. Any assistance to civilian populations in opposition-controlled areas, any services provided to areas outside the government control, is considered by the authorities as an act of resistance, as tacit support for the opposition.

Humanitarian assistance, which follows the principle of impartiality and neutrality, therefore has to be delivered in great confidentiality, through secret networks bound together by solidarity. Supplies are smuggled through tunnels and along dirt roads, over rivers and on the backs of donkeys through rough mountain terrain, in order to reach those communities that are cut off from all basic support.

[The Guardian]

UN resumes humanitarian aid to Syria

The United Nations said it resumed humanitarian aid deliveries to war-torn Syria on Thursday.

Jens Laerke, a spokesman of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told Reuters that an inter-agency convoy would cross conflict lines into a besieged area of rural Damascus.

“We will advise on the exact locations once the convoy has actually reached those locations,” he said.

The Damascus branch of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent tweeted images of its aid vehicles on the move.

The U.N. suspended aid deliveries on Tuesday after the convoy was struck near Aleppo in northern Syria the previous day. The Syrian Arab Red Crescent said one of its employees and around 20 civilians were killed.

[USA Today]