Red Cross Sec Gen thanks work of migrant helpers at Roszke

Budapest (MTI) – The Secretary General of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent thanked members of the Hungarian Red Cross for their work helping migrants during a visit at Roszke collection point on Sunday.

“We deplore the crises that are putting so many people on the move. Those crises are related to war conflicts and all the kind of disasters that push people to try to regain their livelihoods,” Elhadj As Sy told public service news channel M1.

“When people are on the move … we need to accompany them … to be protected, to be safe,” he said, adding that humanitarian services must be provided and his organisation was here to assess the needs.

“We are looking to see how we can partner with governments, civil society organisations and UN agencies to better support the needs of these people,” he added.

Asked to comment on positive feedback from migrants about services in Hungary, Sy said “if they say so they have a reason to say so. We take their view and we respect it.” “This is an opportunity for me to praise my colleagues at the Hungarian Red Cross for what they are doing,” he said, adding that at the same time the organisation always strives to do better and to do it faster.

He praised the attitudes of locals in encountering migrants. “Local communities are the first ones to give a bottle of water, even though they don’t have much,” Sy told M1.

“When you talk to them they express appreciation, but we have to understand the lack of patience that people have. We call them migrants, but yesterday they were teachers and engineers, proud fathers and mothers, like me and you, and this is not a situation that they like to be in. Whatever support is provided should be with respect and speed so that they can get out of this situation of precarity as soon as possible,” he said.

Photo: MTI

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters