Every day, 34,000 people are forcibly displaced — ripped from the normal rhythms of life and plunged into absolute uncertainty. Will they live? Will they have anywhere to sleep? Will they be able to get food and water? What about their families? Where are they?
These aren't questions people in the 21st century have to ask themselves. Yet all around the world, conflict is making life nearly impossible for millions of children, women, and men.
As one girl in the video above says, "We just want to be able to go to school and live in peace without having guns pointed at us."
Without the brave and tireless work of humanitarian workers, their situations would be decisively more dire.
But the aid workers in the field ease the plights of refugees and those displaced by providing crucial resources and at least a semblance of order. Oftentimes, they put their lives on the line in the process.
Recently, aid workers in South Sudan were brutally assaulted by soldiers. Attacks on and kidnappings of aid workers are rising around the world, dettering future aid workers and terrorizing those in the fields.
So on this year's World Humanitarian Day, remember the hard work of humanitarians everywhere. Visit UNHCR for more information.