Preserving the independent and impartial work of the ICRC

“The prerequisite for the credibility of neutrality is its absolute reliability and the constant striving for impartiality. In this area, Switzerland has a unique experience that it can put at the service of world peace.” This was the admonition of the Swiss historian Wolfgang von Wartburg at the beginning of the 1990s.¹

Today, while some politicians and media have almost completely lost their Swiss compass, Wolfgang von Wartburg’s admonishing words are of urgent relevance, also for the Red Cross. For the indispensable work of the ICRC, which has its headquarters in our country not by chance, is closely linked to the credibility of Swiss neutrality. Despite the great need of people around the globe, the ICRC is currently having difficulties raising enough donations. We are looking into the causes.

Humanitarian crises have increased worldwide –
and with it the activities and the budget of the ICRC

The ICRC Annual Report 2022 of 29 June 2023² provides detailed information on what the ICRC is doing in the individual countries and regions of the world. More than 20,000 staff members dedicate their lives to millions of people in war and crisis zones. These “activities are part of our mandate to protect the lives and dignity of victims of war, and to promote respect for international humanitarian law.” (Introductory remarks to the Annual Report on the ICRC’s website)
  According to Swissinfo.ch, in 2013 around 140 million people worldwide were dependent on humanitarian aid from the Red Cross; by 2023 this figure has risen to 340 million! Accordingly, the ICRC’s budget has more than doubled.³
  Because of the 2.8 billion Swiss francs that the ICRC had budgeted for 2023, there were critical voices who felt that it had expanded its activities too much and was engaging in development cooperation, which other humanitarian organisations could do as well, instead of sticking to its core mission – life-saving relief and protection services for people in armed conflicts. ICRC President Mirjana Spoljaric Egger disagrees: “It is not so clear-cut to define what is part of the core mission and what is not. Take water supply, for example: shall we simply deliver water tanks in Syria that are empty after two days? That is neither sustainable nor sensible. So we try to keep the local water supply going, which was destroyed or severely impaired during the fighting.”⁴ This sounds convincing even to non-experts.
  Nevertheless, under this pressure, the ICRC management reduced its budget to around 2.45 billion. This has resulted in the elimination of 1,800 jobs and the closure of 26 branches (out of 350) as well as the downsizing of other locations – certainly none of them are dispensable for the people in need. Some of the ICRC staff reacted to the cuts with a letter in which they expressed their understandable concern – not only because of the threatened redundancies, but also in view of the people in need, who must not be denied the necessary support. What is out of place, however, is the employees’ criticism of the cadres’ salaries. In contrast to the top executives of large corporations, the ICRC’s top staff do not earn millions for their professionally and humanly demanding work.⁵
  As noted in the ICRC Annual Report 2022, the fact remains that humanitarian needs continued to grow “as armed conflicts drove global instability and spread fragility within societies and social systems. This, together with the concomitant effects of the climate crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic and mounting economic uncertainty, posed additional difficulties to the delivery of aid for people affected by armed conflict and other situations of violence” (Annual Report, p. 42) In the interview, the ICRC President names the wars in Ukraine, the Horn of Africa, Ethiopia and Sudan, the earthquake in the border region between Syria and Turkey, the worsening situation in Afghanistan and the devastating consequences of climate change in Africa as major challenges.

In many places, the ICRC is the
only organisation that can provide aid

It is of great importance that the ICRC helps in many regions where other humanitarian organisations cannot gain access or do not even aspire to do so. As Ms. Spoljaric Egger explains: “Unfortunately, even programmes that are indisputably part of our core tasks are underfunded. And because of our neutrality and independence, we are often the only organisation that can provide aid. I was in the north-east of Syria and in Russia. Apart from us, no one has access to prisoners there.”⁶
  Anyone who consults various sources, will come to the same conclusion: after the earthquake at the beginning of March, many Western states and organisations became active in Turkey, but in Syria, apart from the ICRC, there were many Arab institutions on the ground, but hardly any Western ones. As far as the war in Ukraine is concerned, all those who want to help the Ukrainians should be happy if the ICRC presidency maintains the dialogue with the Russian government. How else can it check whether the Ukrainian prisoners of war in Russia are being treated in accordance with the Geneva Conventions? The same must of course apply to the Russian prisoners in Ukraine.

How the ICRC is funded

“The ICRC is funded by voluntary contributions from the States party to the Geneva Conventions (governments); national Red Cross and Red Crescent societies; supranational organizations (such as the European Commission); and public and private sources. Each year the ICRC launches appeals to cover its projected costs in the field and at headquarters. It will launch additional appeals if needs in the field increase. The ICRC accounts for its work and expenditure in its Annual Report.”⁷
  This year it is particularly difficult to raise the necessary amounts. Despite the austerity measures, there is still a shortfall of 400 million francs. At a press conference in Geneva on 13 June, the ICRC president called on states to close this gap. More detailed research has revealed the following:
  Donor states have not (as one might suspect) fundamentally cut back on their contributions: according to the 2022 Annual Report (p. 45), 80.4 % of last year›s contributions came from 80 governments and the European Commission, and some were remarkably higher than in 2021. The five donor states with the largest contributions: USA 609 million francs (2021: 543.6), Germany 206 million (2021: 247.5), Switzerland 166 million (2021: 156.5), UK 160 million (2021: 153.1), EU Commission 160 million (2021: 128.9).
  But the ICRC is severely constrained in its operations for another very troubling reason.

Freedom of the ICRC
increasingly restricted

“The ICRC’s neutral, impartial and independent approach – as enshrined in its mission – […] require[s] access to flexible funding.” This means that donations should be able to be used at any time where they are most urgently needed. The more conditions donors impose on the use of their contributions, the greater the risk that not all people affected by war and violence can be helped equally.
  According to the 2022 Annual Report, “earmarked” contributions, i.e., primarily “country-earmarked” contributions (use of money only for one or more specific countries), have increased to a “worrisome” extent in recent years, from an already very high 51 % (2021) to 54 % (2022) “in particular driven by the situation in Ukraine”. “Furthermore, earmarked contributions were often accompanied by rigorous implementation timetables and stringently specific reporting conditions that increased the administrative burden on its staff.” For example, in Ukraine, some states only wanted to fund operations in certain districts. The percentage of unrestricted, flexible funds dropped to only 29 % (2022 Annual Report, p. 46/47)! With such regulations, the Red Cross loses a large part of its freedom of action.
  According to its own report, the ICRC has been active in Ukraine since 2014, with its teams working on both sides of the front, and in addition to “new offices in Moldova, Hungary, Poland and Romania”, it has also “expanded the operational capacities” of the ICRC delegation in Russia, which opened in 1992.⁸
  The 2021 and 2022 annual reports show that the ICRC was forced to spend a disproportionate amount of money on Ukraine last year, driving up funding needs by more than 300 million francs alone.
  The largest ICRC operations in 2021: 1. Syria 150.6 million francs; 2. Yemen 112.5 million; 3. South Sudan 107.1 million; (then Iraq, Democratic Republic of Congo, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Somalia); and 9. Ukraine 69 million.
  The largest ICRC operations in 2022: 1. Ukraine 381.6 million francs; 2. Afghanistan 190.6 million; 3. Syria 179.3 million; 4. Yemen 128.6 million.
  It should be noted that, in accordance with the mandate given to them by the international community, ICRC teams must have the freedom to deliver aid where people’s needs are most urgent. The ICRC states, “A continued rise in the level of earmarking could compromise the ICRC’s ability to operate in an independent and impartial manner.” This is truly worrisome as every mission is always hanging by a thread because there is always a risk that doubts about strict neutrality will be raised, often where there is no justification for doing so.

Mainstream media contribute their share

The ICRC Annual Report 2022 points out in no uncertain terms the role of some media outlets that severely complicate the work of the Red Cross and even try to discredit it. In plain language: “While IHL [International Humanitarian Law] and the ICRC’s mission, mandate and principles remained as relevant as ever, they continued to be challenged by the narratives of highly polarized communities in various types of media and misinformation, disinformation and hate speech; principled humanitarian action was subjected to heightened scrutiny and politicization.” The ICRC felt compelled to counter the “fake news”, “to clarify the ICRC’s mandate and its neutral, impartial and independent humanitarian approach.”
  Moreover, mainstream media biased the attention of potential donors to the Ukraine war and some other crisis regions: “The ICRC also drew attention to the needs in Haiti, Iraq, Yemen and other contexts that received less coverage.” (Annual Report, p. 42)
  With their disinformation, these media are complicit in “an increasingly challenging funding environment and a lack of international consensus on issues of humanitarian concern”, which the Annual Report deplores. It is urgent to bring back into focus the concern of the founders of the ICRC and the signatory states of the Geneva Conventions to provide humanitarian assistance equally to all victims of war and violence in all countries and on both sides of the front.

Costly security measures

Another alarming consequence of these processes is that the ICRC no longer enjoys the security that the Red Cross in the white field has guaranteed its delegates and their teams for most of its 160-year history. Former delegate Manuel Bessler reports that this was still different in the early 1990s: “Back then, when we arrived somewhere in the field, we were always told: “The Red Cross emblem will protect you!” Today, this often becomes a crosshair itself – in the literal sense. Protected vehicles, safety training, ‘safe rooms’ or armed escorts, which are unfortunately necessary today, were not known in the past. All this, of course, comes at a price.”⁹

The ICRC is based on the
humanitarian tradition of Switzerland

Until 1993, anyone who wanted to become an ICRC delegate had to have a red passport, says Manuel Bessler, who started at the ICRC back then. Today, 9 % of the delegates are still Swiss citizens, at the headquarters in Geneva it is 30 %. 80 % of the more than 20,000 employees come from the respective countries of operation.¹⁰
  One has the impression, the interviewer tells the ICRC president, “that not much of this Swissness[!] has remained”. Ms. Spoljaric Egger disagrees: “I would dispute that. The Swissness is automatically given, since the ICRC is based on the humanitarian tradition of Switzerland, it has always belonged to the international Geneva and is committed to neutrality. At the same time, the ICRC is universal, all states have ratified the Geneva Conventions, which form the basis of international humanitarian law.” [Emphasis mine, mw] She adds that the ICRC could not achieve the impact it does in its respective missions without the expertise and local knowledge of its staff: “You cannot define the Swissness of the organisation by the origin of the staff.”¹¹ Switzerland’s neutrality, Ms. Spoljaric Egger continues, “is the reason why we are anchored in Geneva. It’s a place that gives us the space to operate freely and independently.”  •

¹ von Wartburg, Wolfgang. Die Neutralität der Schweiz und ihre Zukunft (Switzerlandʼs neutrality and its future), Novalis Verlag 1992, p. 2
² https://library.icrc.org/library/docs/DOC/icrc-annual-report-2022-1.pdf
³ Burkhalter, Dorian. “Das IKRK steckt in einer Finanzierungskrise – jetzt lanciert es einen Appell” (The ICRC is in a funding crisis – now it launches an appeal). Swissinfo.ch dated 13 June 2023 
⁴ Gall, Corina und Fumagalli, Antonio. “Das IKRK von 1980 könnte so gar nicht mehr bestehen” (The ICRC of 1980 could no longer exist in this way at all). Interview with ICRC-President Mirjana Spoljaric Egger. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 1 July 2023
⁵ Fumagalli, Antonio. “Hat sich das IKRK verzettelt? Mitarbeiter üben harsche Kritik am Expansionskurs der vergangenen Jahre” (Has the ICRC got bogged down? Staff members harshly criticize the expansion course of the past years). In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 7 July 2023
⁶ Gall, Corina und Fumagalli, Antonio. “Das IKRK von 1980 könnte so gar nicht mehr bestehen” (The ICRC of 1980 could no longer exist in this way at all). Interview with ICRC-President Mirjana Spoljaric Egger. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 1 July 2023
⁷ https://www.icrc.org/en/who-we-are/finances
⁸ https://www.icrc.org/en/humanitarian-crisis-ukraine
⁹ Fumagalli, Antonio. “Hat sich das IKRK verzettelt? Mitarbeiter üben harsche Kritik am Expansionskurs der vergangenen Jahre” (Has the ICRC got bogged down? Staff members harshly criticize the expansion course of the past years). In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 7 July 2023 
¹⁰ Fumagalli, Antonio. “Hat sich das IKRK verzettelt? Mitarbeiter üben harsche Kritik am Expansionskurs der vergangenen Jahre” (Has the ICRC got bogged down? Staff members harshly criticize the expansion course of the past years). In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 7 July 2023
¹¹ Gall, Corina und Fumagalli, Antonio. “Das IKRK von 1980 könnte so gar nicht mehr bestehen” (The ICRC of 1980 could no longer exist in this way at all). Interview mit IKRK-Präsidentin Mirjana Spoljaric Egger. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung of 1 July 2023