Tens of thousands of refugees and immigrants are stuck in Greece. The Finnish Red Cross will send a specialist to support the international aid operation.
The office of Amnesty International in Finland, the Finnish Red Cross, the Finnish Refugee Council, the Finnish Refugee Advice Centre, Finn Church Aid, Save the Children Finland, the Federation of Mother and Child Homes and Shelters, and the Finnish Somali League have criticised measures which would make it more difficult to reunite families.
The Red Cross appeals to everyone to help Ethiopians. A severe drought means that millions of people in Ethiopia and in sub-Saharan Africa have no food.
At the moment, the efficient way to get help to those in need in Syria is via the Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund. The local volunteers do significant aid work in live-threatening conditions. They assist the Syrian people every day by delivering food, medicine and blankets.
The trucks, carrying food, medical supplies, blankets, and other aid supplies arrived in the towns of Madaya, Foa’a, and Kefraya on Monday, 11 January.
Many young people spend their Christmas alone, against their will. Every year, young people with nobody to spend the holidays with gather at the Red Cross Youth Shelter’s Christmas on-call service. For some, home might be too uncomfortable. At the Shelter, the young can spend their Christmas in a safe environment and discuss their worries with reliable adults.
Ban Ki-moon visited a reception centre maintained by the Finnish Red Cross and called the Finnish reception centre system a great example of efficiency.
Finnish language skills are often emphasized as a key factor to adapt in Finland’s society as a foreigner. Jana, Juan and Dani share their struggle and success with the language and give tips to those still learning Finnish. They also send greetings to Finns: please be more open and supportive towards persons learning the language – it is neither simple nor impossible.
The Secretary General of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Elhadj As Sy, who visited Finland in October, was impressed by how Finland cares for asylum seekers. He reminds everyone that humanitarian work needs more support during difficult times.
The Hunger Day collection has already raised over 3.8 million euros this year The result is the best of all time. The funds are used to aid the victims of conflicts and disasters around the world and in Finland.
Over 20,000 asylum seekers have arrived in Finland in a short time. The Finnish Red Cross accommodates over 12,000 asylum seekers at the moment, and thousands of volunteers have helped them along.
A total of EUR 1 405 026 has been donated to the Good Holiday Spirit campaign. The annual campaign by the Finnish Red Cross and the Mannerheim League for Child Welfare was held for the 18th time. This year, a total of 18,000 vouchers, each worth EUR 70, were distributed to low-income families with children in Finland.
The Good Holiday Spirit campaign helps less fortunate families to forget their everyday troubles for a moment, at least for the holidays. Inka Poikela can still remember what receiving a food voucher felt like.
According to the school health survey of 2009, every tenth Finnish youth feels lonely and more and more young people do not have a single friend. The funds raised during the Common Responsibility for Youth (Yhteisvastuu nuoresta) project, ending at the end of the year, were directed at preventing the increasing loneliness of young people during the last three years.
Culture must be taken into account more carefully in preventing disasters and in rebuilding, says the new World Disasters Report published by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).
The Finnish Red Cross needs you all to pitch in and help with the Hunger Day Collection from 18–20 September 2014. Everyone is welcome to take part in this year’s Hunger Day campaign. No previous Red Cross experience is required. Collectors and donors are needed all over Finland.
The Finnish Red Cross commissioned a survey about the joys and concerns of people living in Finland. More than half of those who responded are worried about the growing gap between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’.
The Finnish Red Cross helps refugees to integrate in their new hometown. In Pudasjärvi in northern Finland the local International Club has quickly become a popular meeting place.
The Finnish Red Cross’s new app for tablet devices drew an interested crowd at the World Village Festival in Helsinki in late May 2014. The Risk Zones app offers information about development cooperation and disaster relief.
The Finnish Red Cross is the first NGO in Finland to release an app for tablet devices. The Risk Zones application uses photos, videos, stories and graphics to show how people can minimise risks, prepare for and survive disasters.
Red Cross volunteers in the Tampere region have been providing psychological support to the families who lost someone in the air crash on Sunday 20 April 2014, which took the life of eight skydivers.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is extremely concerned about spiralling violence in Ukraine, and about the lack of respect for medical and humanitarian work and for those carrying it out.
The Finnish Red Cross helps Filipinos who lost their livelihood to typhoon Haiyan and helps them to buy building supplies. The clinic that was sent from Finland is already run by local healthcare professionals.
‘I recognised the value of the work done by the Red Cross after the Sichuan earthquake in 2008, so I decided to join as a volunteer,’ says general medical practitioner, Doctor Luo Xian Xin.
The Chinese Red Cross has just over two million volunteers. That’s as many people as live in all of Latvia. Volunteers are vitally important to the Red Cross, particularly in disaster relief and first-aid training.
‘My crops used to rot away under flood waters or fail to flourish when there was a drought. Now, any excess water is drained away from the fields into a channel, which then provides water for irrigation during periods of drought,’ Chinese farmer Tian Ruxiong rejoices over the help provided by the Red Cross.
'I would like to work less, but it’s just not possible. If I did, my family would not have enough to live on,' says Wei Xiuxue, a 70-year-old Chinese farmer.
He lives in southwest China in Guizhou province, one of the poorest regions in the country where an EU-financed Red Cross programme is improving the conditions of remote rural communities.
Over recent years Wen Xian Liang of China has learnt what to do if a natural disaster strikes.She regularly takes part in preparedness exercises arranged by the Red Cross together with the local authorities.
Volunteers trained by the Finnish Red Cross did an exemplary job of evacuating people to safety on the island of Panaya in the Aklan Province of the Philippines prior to the landfall of super typhoon Haiyan. Loss of human life and injuries in the area were relatively few.
The Finnish Red Cross collection to help victims of typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines is off to a quick start. Collection centers have been set up in various parts of Finland.
Floods, earthquakes, typhoons and landslides. The Philippines with its hundred million inhabitants and over 7000 islands is constantly tormented by disasters.
The Red Cross report reveals that the lack of information and technology has great impact on peoples’ abilities to prepare themselves, respond to and recover from disasters.
