Dakar (ICRC) – The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has begun distributing food supplies and rice and groundnut seed to over 20,000 people living near the town of São Domingos in north-western Guinea- Bissau, an area where poverty has been aggravated by the low rainfall of 2007.

Dakar (ICRC) – A seminar on implementing international humanitarian law will take place on 3 and 4 June in Praia, the capital of Cape Verde, for the Portuguese-speaking countries of Africa and the Pacific (Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Sao Tome and Principe, and Timor-Leste).

Conakry (ICRC) – Working in cooperation with the Guinean health ministry, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has renovated eight medical facilities, making them better able to handle any sudden influx of casualties.

The ICRC is running a practical and theoretical seminar on the surgical treatment of gunshot wounds at the university hospitals of Donka and Ignace Conakry from 15 to 22 September.

Together with the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights and the Ministry of Public Health, the ICRC held a third regional round-table on health care in prisons in Guinea on 10 August.

Recent ICRC activities in the field

Geneva/Conakry (ICRC) – Deeply concerned by the situation in Guinea, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) calls on all those involved in the violence that is rocking the country to show restraint and respect the basic principles of humanity.

Geneva/Conakry (ICRC) – With the support of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Red Cross Society of Guinea has launched a major operation to provide first aid for victims of the violence in the country.

Geneva (ICRC) - Years of armed conflict and internal disturbances in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Côte d'Ivoire and Guinea have left thousands of people without news of their families, including innumerable children who became separated from their parents in the midst of the chaos.

For the first time since February, the ICRC today reunited children living in Guinea with their families in Liberia. Six Liberian children were returned to their loved ones in Monrovia.

Last week the ICRC and the Liberia National Red Cross Society launched a large-scale tracing campaign in five West African countries.

Volunteers from the Red Cross Society of Guinea are helping the country's authorities facilitate the return home of thousands of Guineans fleeing the unrest that has gripped Côte d'Ivoire in the past six months.

The conflicts in Liberia and Côte d’Ivoire have turned tens of thousands of Liberians into refugees in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Côte d’Ivoire.