A man wounded during fighting in Mogadishu undergoes surgery in Keysaney hospital, November 2007 – Keysaney and Medina hospitals are the main referral hospitals for treating war wounded. Since January 2007 these hospitals received more than 4,000 people injured by weapons, 30 per cent being women and children. The ICRC calls on the warring parties to comply with the rules of international humanitarian law, in particular to take care at all times to safeguard the lives and dignity of the civilian population. The ICRC also urgently calls on the parties to take every precaution to spare medical facilities and humanitarian workers, and to permit the rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian assistance.