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UN / WORLD HUMANITARIAN DAY WRAP
STORY: UN / WORLD HUMANITARIAN DAY WRAP
TRT: 3.39
SOURCE: UNTV / UNHCR / WHO / PAHO / MINUSTAH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 19 AUGUST 2010, NEW YORK CITY / 18 AUGUST 2010, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND / FILE
RECENT 2010, NEW YORK CITY
1. Wide shot, exterior United Nations headquarters
19 AUGUST 2010, NEW YORK CITY
2. Med shot, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon arrives to ceremony
3. Med shot, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon greets OCHA Emergency Relief Coordinator Sir John Holmes
4. Cutaway, audience at ceremony
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Sir John Holmes, Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations:
“The theme of today is: ‘I am a Humanitarian’. We want to make clear that aid workers represent no one ideology or standpoint, they reflect all cultures, ideologies, religions and backgrounds. The vast majority of aid workers come from the countries in which they work, and most of the victims of attacks on humanitarian workers are the same national staff. These brave individuals are united by their shared commitment to humanitarianism, which is a universal value and a universal responsibility. They work on behalf of everyone.”
FILE / WHO / SEPTEMBER 2009, PHILIPPINES
1. Pan right, water in streets and people in improvised boats
FILE / WHO / 2005, MUZAFFARABAD, PAKISTAN
2. Various shots, patient care and damage following the 8 Oct 2005 earthquake
FILE / PAHO / AUGUST 2007, PISCO, PERU
3. Tilt down, hospital damaged by earthquake
FILE / WHO / 2008, CHINA
4. Various shots, rescue teams assisting victims of the 12 May 2008 earthquake
19 AUGUST 2010, NEW YORK CITY
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General, United Nations:
“Today, on World Humanitarian Day, we renew our pledge; in times of crisis, to do our utmost, to save lives, to offer hope, to be there for those in need during their darkest hour. Today, we also remember. We remember those who died serving this noble cause, and we honour them. This is our calling.”
6. Med shot, Ban Ki-moon arrives to a wreath laying ceremony in memory of the UN Colleagues who perished in the bombing of the United Nations Office in Baghdad, 19 August 2003.
7. Zoom in, wreath laying
8. Med shot, Ban Ki-moon greets Carolina Larriera
9. Med shot, Ban Ki-moon greets staff
STILL IMAGE / UNHCR / APRIL 1995, GROZNY, CHECHENYA
10. Close up, still picture: overview of Grozny
STILL IMAGES / UNHCR / JANUARY 1995, GROZNY, CHECHENYA
11. Various still pictures, families mourn their dead after houses
were bombed by planes
18 AUGUST 2010, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Vincent Cochetel, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) staff member:
“For more than 300 days. So, the most difficult thing to describe is the sort of depths of loneliness you go through, because there is nothing happening in the darkness. And to describe that is difficult because it’s 15 minutes of light, the rest is you’re just alone by yourself. So you try not to think too much, because otherwise you’ll get crazy, but you have to keep your mind busy.”
STILL IMAGE / UNHCR / DATE UNKNOWN, CHECHENYA
13. Still image, Vincent Cochetel and other UNHCR staff taking notes on top of a UNHCR van
STILL IMAGES / UNHCR / AUGUST 1995, GROZNY, CHECHENYA
14. Still image, man holding an unexploded missile in his hands
18 AUGUST 2010, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
15. SOUNDBITE (English) Vincent Cochetel, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), staff member:
“You go through a lot of existentialist moments. You question the rationale of what you were doing. But again looking back, if I had to do it again I think there was a good rationale for us to be there. We were feeding half a million people, we were restoring water supply to the entire republic, we were helping IDPs [internally displaced persons] to go back there, rebuilding schools, rebuilding social infrastructure, assisting people. We had good reasons to be there.”
STILL IMAGES / UNHCR / AUGUST 1995, CHECHENYA
16. Still image, elderly woman with two young girls
17. Still image, women looking through window
18. Still image, woman walking by a UNHCR van
FILE / MINUSTAH / 12 -15 JANUARY 2010, PORT AU PRINCE, HAITI
19. Wide shot, UN vans on a convoluted street and 2 helicopters flying
20. Various shots, street scenes, make-shift homes and people on streets
21. Various shots, people crowding around truck for food
22. Med shot, people fighting for food at truck
United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and UN Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes marked World Humanitarian Day today by lauding aid workers for their tireless efforts to help those who have lived through wars, catastrophes and other terrible events.
At a ceremony marking the event, Holmes said that while there were many worldwide in need of aid, a relief workers’ ability to reach them was increasingly at risk.
SOUNDBITE (English) Sir John Holmes, Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations:
“The theme of today is: ‘I am a Humanitarian’. We want to make clear that aid workers represent no one ideology or standpoint, they reflect all cultures, ideologies, religions and backgrounds. The vast majority of aid workers come from the countries in which they work, and most of the victims of attacks on humanitarian workers are the same national staff. These brave individuals are united by their shared commitment to humanitarianism, which is a universal value and a universal responsibility. They work on behalf of everyone.”
The world body is spotlighting the needs of the people that aid workers try to help – such as the 10 million refugees and the nearly 30 million others uprooted within their own borders, as well as the one in every six people in the world who are chronically hungry, and also the victims of natural disasters which humanitarian staff all over the world reach out to.
SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General, United Nations:
“Today, on World Humanitarian Day, we renew our pledge; in times of crisis, to do our utmost, to save lives, to offer hope, to be there for those in need during their darkest hour. Today, we also remember. We remember those who died serving this noble cause, and we honour them. This is our calling.”
The General Assembly proclaimed 19 August as World Humanitarian Day two years ago to commemorate the 2003 Canal Hotel bombing in Baghdad, which claimed the lives of 22 UN staff members, including the world body’s top envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello, and wounded more than 150 people.
Ban laid a wreath at UN Headquarters in New York in remembrance of the personnel who lost their lives.
Over many years, humanitarian aid workers have relied on the acceptance that they need to be protected by all parties to ensure they can work wherever they are needed. But increasingly, a perception is spreading that humanitarian aid is delivered exclusively by Western organizations, or agencies, which somehow represent one ideological or religious world view, and the manifestation of that perception is the increasing number of targeted attacks on humanitarian personnel, killing, injuring, and kidnapping more humanitarian aid workers every year.
Vincent Cochetel was the head of UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) in North Ossetia, Russia, when three masked men armed with handguns kidnapped him and his bodyguard as he arrived at his home in the town of Vladikavkaz on 29 January 1998. He spent almost all of that year chained to a bed frame in a dark cellar in the Caucasus.
He spent 317 days at the mercy of his abductors, who tortured him and deprived him of light for all but 15 minutes each day.
SOUNDBITE (English) Vincent Cochetel, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) staff member:
“For more than 300 days. So, the most difficult thing to describe is the sort of depths of loneliness you go through; because there is nothing happening in the darkness. And to describe that is difficult because it’s 15 minutes of light, the rest is you’re just alone by yourself. So you try not to think too much, because otherwise you’ll get crazy, but you have to keep your mind busy.”
He said he went through many “existential moments” during his period of captivity as he questioned the rationale of what he was doing there.
SOUNDBITE (English) Vincent Cochetel, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) staff member:
“You go through a lot of existentialist moments. You question the rationale of what you were doing. But again looking back, if I had to do it again I think there was a good rationale for us to be there. We were feeding half a million people, we were restoring water supply to the entire republic, we were helping IDPs [internally displaced persons] to go back there, rebuilding schools, rebuilding social infrastructure, assisting people. We had good reasons to be there.”
Cochetel was finally freed by Russian commandos in December 1998 and was able to recuperate, the then 37-year-old went back to the UN refugee agency – where he still works today.
Last year, 102 humanitarian workers lost their lives, compared with 30 deaths among aid workers in 1999. In addition, nearly 280 aid workers were victims of security incidents, more the quadruple the number one decade ago.
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