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They are forced to travel huge distances, often on foot, to seek safe refuge from the fighting – these are the displaced populations of Africa. The following collection provides a glimpse of the many places in Africa where people are forced to leave their homes.

In Chad, sporadic clashes between armed opposition groups and the army continue following the failed offensive on the capital, N'djamena in early February. As bad as this may be, intercommunity clashes in the east have most impact on cilvilians - particularly in the region of Dar Sila and parts of northern Assoungha. No security forces are present to stop the fighting and banditry and lawlessness regularly limit the scale of humanitarian efforts.

Zimbabweans are facing extremely hard economic times resulting in the highest inflation rate in the world, a situation which is putting added pressure on the country's already weakened healthcare system. The ICRC is supporting 16 rural health structures in three districts.

The ICRC is the only humanitarian organization with a large-scale operation in Gereida camp in South Darfur, where it continues to provide for the basic needs of over 120,000 displaced people. This gallery presents the latest in a series of images illustrating the organization's activities throughout Darfur, providing for basic needs, health services, war wounded surgery, water and agricultural support.

In a country ravaged by more than 15 years of armed conflict and natural disasters, the light at the end of the tunnel still seems a long way off. A series of images that show the faces behind the conflict, and what the ICRC is doing to bring relief to its victims.

Thousands of people in north western Central African Republic abandoned their homes and took refuge in the forest when fighting between government forces and armed rebels broke out in 2006. The ICRC is providing essential household items to over 13,000 families living a precarious existence between stability and flight.

It is estimated that the decade-long conflict in Uganda has forced over 1.7 million people from their homes into camps for the displaced. In February-March 2007, the ICRC distributed substantial aid to some 560,000 displaced people currently living in camps, returning to their homes or resettling after years of displacement.

The ICRC and the Nigerian Red Cross work together on a range of activities which include helping those affected by violence, immunizing children against disease and improving conditions in detention facilities.

Civilians continue to bear the brunt of a four-year-old conflict that has intensified since the beginning of 2006. While many aid agencies have had to reduce or abandon their activities due to deteriorating security conditions in many parts of Darfur, the ICRC continues the majority of its operations with activities focused both on the displaced and others identified as being at risk of attack or future displacement.

Photos illustrating ICRC activities in Somalia. The media is welcome to use these images, which can be downloaded at high resolution.

Somalis living along the Shabele and Juba rivers, who have already suffered from a dreadful drought and whose very existence is jeopardized by the ongoing armed violence, now have to contend with the worst floods the country has experienced in recent years.

This gallery contains images and excerpts from a new ICRC photo exhibition that provides a fresh look at the humanitarian situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It depicts the central human concerns arising out of years of violence in which hundreds of thousands of people lost their lives, focusing on key issues such as child soldiers, sexual violence, health, water, economic security, helping abandoned communities, reuniting families and 'fighting right', and provides an overview of what the ICRC is doing to tackle these challenges.

Since the end of 2004, many Liberians have begun to return to homes they fled at the height of the fighting. This collection of photos shows how the ICRC is supporting returnees and residents to pick up the pieces of their interrupted lives.

A selection of photographs focusing on the situation in Somalia and ICRC activities on behalf of those affected by drought and conflict. They may be downloaded for use by the media.

After two decades of fighting between the Ugandan authorities and the Lords Resistance Army there remains little sign of a peaceful solution. In response to the deteriorating humanitarian situation, the ICRC resumed its field activities in 2004, suspended three years earlier after the killing of six staff members in north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

The ICRC helps the people most severely affected by the conflict in Casamance to return to a normal life. Access to health care and safe drinking water are priorities.

Every week, the ICRC repatriates dozens of children displaced by war in West Africa. These children, who come from Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Côte d'Ivoire, often spend many long years in refugee camps before they can return to their families. In February 2005, Vassily Fadeev and Jean-Yves Clémenzo, two ICRC communication delegates based in Guinea and Liberia, accompanied six of them on their trip back home.

The ICRC delegation in Côte d’Ivoire has taken the original step of asking street children in Abidjan, under the supervision of the Red Cross Society of Côte d’Ivoire, to produce illustrations relating to the basic rules of humanitarian law. The best drawings were published in a calendar.

Between April and July 1994 the population of Rwanda experienced a nightmare; hundreds of thousands failed to survive it. Selection of photographs by Claude Gluntz of the Swiss magazine L'Illustré, Thierry Gassmann, Josué Anselmo and Patrick Fuller of the ICRC.