Peter Maurer Quotes
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While the nature of warfare is changing and wars are moving into cities, they are also becoming longer and their consequences more impactful.
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To respond to people's needs, humanitarian action has evolved from a temporary fix to a long-term safety net.
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You can't expect humanitarian and development agencies to rebuild Syria. There is not enough money. There is not enough capacity. There are not enough skills.
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We still have a strong commitment to our original mission, which is to protect and assist people who are suffering from the impact of violence, but the violence has changed its character, format, and pattern so that we are now responding year after year.
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I have known Sepp Blatter, FIFA and football for a long time, and there are some fundamental values which FIFA and the ICRC share.
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You don't torture people. You don't indiscriminately attack civilians. You protect as good as you can the impact of your warfare on women and children.
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Trust into leadership evaporates with communities when they see that their problems are not adequately addressed, neither at the national level nor at the international arena.
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It is very clear from the text of the Geneva Conventions that families have the right to know about the whereabouts of their missing and that belligerents have a duty to inform families if they have indication and if they are detaining people.
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We live in an environment in which connectivity and cyberspace are transforming all workplaces, including the humanitarian workplace.
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The humanitarian ecosystem is diverse - not only is there a variety of traditional humanitarian actors, but the system should also embrace an increasing diversity of private sector actors.
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The young, the old, women, the disabled, the sick and the wounded are entitled to protection under international law. Too often, the ICRC's calls for those laws to be respected are ignored.
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Suffering does not change its face.
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Fragility, violence, and conflict are complex. Fragility is influenced by a wide set of factors, many of which are deeply entrenched, such as high social and income inequality. The lines between criminal, inter-communal, and politically motivated violence are often blurred.
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Torture can destroy the social fabric of communities, degrade a society's institutions, and undermine the integrity of its political systems.
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As conflicts last longer, as the scale of needs increase, we are having to adapt. There is an increasing blurring between immediate humanitarian assistance and long-term development needs.
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The whole essence of humanitarian work and the Geneva Convention is that neutral, impartial organisations can operate during war.
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The Fourth Industrial Revolution does not just entail risks: it also brings solutions to humanitarian problems.
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Although the ICRC and the World Economic Forum have separate missions, they both are centred on collaboration across sectors and between various actors in order to improve the state of the world.
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Every day, we hear of civilians being killed and wounded in violation of the basic rules of international humanitarian law and with total impunity. Instability is spreading. Suffering is growing. No country can remain untouched.
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You treat detainees humanely because you know the other side will also treat detainees humanely.
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Self-reliance is not always possible; we have to acknowledge that there are situations of dramatic crisis which will force us to substitute non-existing public delivery systems.
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Experience shows that the reliance on illegal, immoral, and inhumane interrogation techniques is universally a very poor choice.
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Torture and other forms of cruel or humiliating treatment are an affront to humanity, and the physical and psychological scars can last a lifetime.
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Not only does disability impact individual health and well-being, it also leads to social and economic exclusion.