Mali: ICRC helps families affected by intercommunal violence
04-09-2009 News Release 09/176
Bamako (ICRC) – With support from the Mali Red Cross, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has launched an aid operation in behalf of 231 displaced families in Ansongo Cercle (Gao Region), northern Mali.
The approximately 1,150 aid recipients fled their homes in mid-June following an outbreak of intercommunal violence in Inmahag, Lellehoy/Tantala and Baba Sourgou (Ansongo Cercle). On 2 and 3 September they were given blankets, tarpaulins, kitchen utensils, collapsible jerrycans, mosquito nets, teapots, buckets, sleeping mats and soap.
" The support from the Red Cross will help us and those who took us in, especially during the current rainy season, until we are able to return to our homes, " said a villager from Baba Sourgou.
The Mali Red Cross will be supporting the operation through its office in Ansongo by providing volunteers at each of the sites concerned. The local authorities have played an active part in choosing those receiving aid.
In August, the ICRC and the Mali Red Cross provided aid for 2,300 displaced people in Kidal Region, also in northern Mali, who had fled their homes in July 2007 as a result of fighting in the region.
The ICRC runs its activities in Mali through offices in Bamako and Gao, in cooperation with the Mali Red Cross.
The ICRC is an impartial, neutral and independent organization. Its exclusively humanitarian task is to ensure that victims of armed conflict and other violence receive protection and assistance. It also endeavours to prevent suffering by promoting and strengthening humanitarian law and universal humanitarian principles.
For further information, please contact:
Attaher Maïga, ICRC Gao, tel: +223 66 75 26 18 or +223 66 75 26 19
Mame Ibrahima Tounkara, ICRC Dakar, tel: +221 77 529 71 44