First World Humanitarian Day to raise public awareness, honour humanitarian staff, those who gave their lives in cause of duty, 19 August at UN Headquarters

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The first World Humanitarian Day will be observed on Wednesday, 19 August, at United Nations Headquarters with a wreath-laying ceremony remembering the victims of the 2003 attack on the United Nations in Baghdad, followed by the opening of an exhibition of posters and photographs capturing the images of humanitarian workers in action.

Both events will take place in the General Assembly Building public lobby, beginning at 10:25 a.m. Following the wreath-laying by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Assistant-Secretary-General Catherine Bragg of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), will make opening remarks. The Secretary-General will make a statement to launch the first World Humanitarian Day.

The date, designated by the General Assembly in December 2008 (document A/RES/63/139), marks the day of the Canal Hotel bombing in Baghdad. The truck bomb attack of 19 August 2003 took the lives of 22 staff members, including the top United Nations envoy in Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello, and wounded more than 150.

The General Assembly proclaimed the Day to increase public awareness about humanitarian assistance activities worldwide, as well as to honour all humanitarian and United Nations and associated personnel who have worked in promoting the humanitarian cause and those who have lost their lives in the cause of duty. This inaugural year, the focus will be on commemorating those whose lives have been lost while engaged in humanitarian operations, but will also put emphasis on current humanitarian needs and challenges.

The exhibition and its launch are organized by OCHA. The wreath-laying ceremony is organized by the Staff Council's Standing Committee on the Security and Independence of the International Civil Service.

For further information, please visit http://ochaonline.un.org/whd, or contact Nicholas Reader at OCHA, tel.: +1 212 963 4961, e-mail: reader@un.org.

For information media - not an official record