Statement from MSF.
Last year, 75 hospitals managed or supported by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) were bombed. This was in violation of the most fundamental rules of war which gives protected status to medical facilities and its patients, regardless if the patients are civilians or wounded combatants. Beyond the hospitals, civilians are being wounded and killed by indiscriminate warfare in Syria, Yemen, South Sudan, Afghanistan and elsewhere. At the same time, the treatment of refugees and migrants in Europe and beyond has shown a shocking lack of humanity. A humanitarian summit, at which states, UN agencies and non-governmental organisations come together to discuss these urgent issues, has never been more needed. So the World Humanitarian Summit (WHS) this month could have been a perfect opportunity.
We can no longer see how the WHS will help the humanitarian sector to address the massive needs caused by continuing violence against patients and medical staff in Syria, Yemen and South Sudan; by civilians intent on fleeing being blocked at borders in Jordan, Turkey and Macedonia; by the inhumane treatment of refugees and migrants desperately trying to find safe haven in Greece and Australia; by the serious gaps we faced during the response to the Ebola epidemic, repeated again, albeit on a smaller scale, in the yellow fever epidemic in Angola today; by the serious restrictions placed by some states on humanitarian access, denying people basic services; and by the continuing lack of effective mobilisation to address recurring disease outbreaks in Democratic Republic of Congo. In all of these situations, the responsibilities of states in their making, and the diminished capacity of the humanitarian system to respond causing yet more suffering and death, will go unaddressed.