International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)

The ICRC works worldwide to provide humanitarian aid for people affected conflict and armed violence and to promote the laws that protect  those people. The ICRC acts as a neutral, impartial and independent humanitarian actors and its most important responsibilities are: engaging a protection dialogue with all parties to the conflict, visiting detainees; reuniting separated families; distributing food and other essential items, protecting and strengthening essential infrastructure and system in the health, water, electricity, economic domain. The ICRC promotes the international humanitarian law and contributes to its development with the ambition to reduce the suffering of people in armed conflicts.

The ICRC holds a clear added value comparatively to other organizations with regards to

• its expertise in protection activities
• humanitarian access
• the respect for and implementation of the humanitarian principles both in its operations as well as throughout its institutional strategy.

One third of the budget of Switzerland’s Humanitarian Aid is allocated to the ICRC, making Switzerland the third most important ICRC-donor. Switzerland is not only depositary state of the Geneva Conventions that form the basis of the ICRC’s work, it also supports the ICRC in its efforts to respond to the continuously evolving humanitarian challenges, to promote respect for humanitarian principles and to strengthen International Humanitarian Law. Switzerland’s support  to the ICRC also ensures its timely and effective response to emergencies, the protection of civilians and the provision of humanitarian assistance in the field.

For more information on the collaboration between SDC and ICRC, please consult the Factsheet: