Dakar (ICRC) – Eighteen months after suspending field operations, the International Committee of the Red Cross is once more present on the
ground in Fogny, northern Casamance.
In preparation for this move, the organization assessed the security situation by making a number of trips along the region’s roads and
visiting villages.
The ICRC also built up contacts with the civilian and military authorities, beneficiaries and the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance.
The ICRC had
suspended all field operations in Fogny following a mine accident on 1 September 2006 in Lefeu that killed a delegate and injured three other staff.
Even during this period, the ICRC
continued to provide assistance from outside the region, transferring some of its work to the northern part of Guinea-Bissau, which had been affected by the events of March 2006.
The ICRC
has been working in Casamance since 2004.
Activities have included renovating water systems, maternity units and health centres, relaunching market-gardening businesses run by groups of
women and supporting community work undertaken by the Senegalese Red Cross Society.
The organization is also promoting international humanitarian law.
Now that the ICRC has
returned to Fogny, the organization will continue to work on improving living conditions in Casamance.
For further information, please contact:
Gianni Volpin, ICRC Dakar,
tel: +221 33 869 13 69
Maurice Grundbacher, ICRC Ziguinchor, tel: +221 77 644 34 57
A boy wearing a shirt with a picture of war crimes suspect Ratko Mladic stands in front of the Serbian flag during a pre-election rally of Serbian Radical Party leader Tomislav ...
