A record number of humanitarian workers were killed in conflicts around the world last year - more than half since the start of the war between Israel and "Hamas" on October 7 - and this year could become even more deadly, the UN said yesterday, the Associated Press reported, quoted by BTA.
The 280 aid workers from 33 countries killed in 2023 was more than double the previous year's 118, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a report marking World Humanitarian Day .
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres wrote on social media that paying tribute to aid workers who died in the deadliest year in history is not enough.
"In Sudan and many other places, aid workers are attacked, killed, wounded and kidnapped. "We demand an end to impunity so that the perpetrators are brought to justice," the UN chief said.
OCHA said this year "may be on track for an even deadlier output”, with 172 aid workers killed as of August 7, a preliminary look at the Aid Worker Security Database shows.< /p>
More than 280 aid workers have died in the 11-month-old war in Gaza, mainly in airstrikes. Most of them are Palestinians who worked for the United Nations relief agency for Palestine refugees, known as UNRWA. OSNA said the "extreme levels of violence in Sudan and South Sudan" have also contributed to the number of victims both this year and last year.
In a letter to the 193 member states of the United Nations, 413 humanitarian organizations from around the world said: "The brutal military actions we have witnessed in many conflicts around the world have revealed a terrible truth: we live in an era of impunity.&ldquo ;
Humanitarian organizations called on all countries, the wider international community and all parties to conflicts to protect civilians and aid workers and to hold perpetrators accountable.
World Humanitarian Day is dedicated to the terrorist bombing on August 19, 2003 against the United Nations offices in the "Canal" hotel. in Baghdad, which killed 22 UN officials, including the UN's top envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello, a Brazilian diplomat.
At a ceremony at UN headquarters yesterday in front of the tattered UN flag removed from the hotel that day, dozens of current UN staff and relatives of some of the victims stood in silent tribute to their memory - as did many onlookers the world.