The Red Cross Round-up

The Round-up offers a weekly sample of what our sister Red Cross Societies are working on around the world.

SYRIA: Volunteers from the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) have been deployed following heavy snow storms which hit the country in recent weeks. Volunteers have been helping people to move out of unfinished buildings and providing heat, blankets and warm clothes.  In Damascus, volunteers responded to several cases related to ice in the streets and motoring accidents. SARC teams have distributed blankets and hot meals to people in Masaken, Barzeh, Hamish and Maisat. They have also managed to help 824 people leave East Gouta to find places in emergency shelters, and distributed 100 mattresses, 220 blankets, 120 kitchen sets, 130 hygiene kits, 300 canned food parcels and 300 kids hygiene kits with a support from the ICRC and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees.

MALAYSIA: Like many of the villages in Kelantan, Kampung Pasir Tumboh has been struggling to obtain clean water since mid-December 2014. As one of the areas affected by the floods that devastated three states in the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia, this village of around 450 people was submerged under floodwater that left waist-deep mud and debris in its wake. Following the floods, the IFRC, in support of the Malaysian Red Crescent Society, recently deployed several volunteers, a Rapid Disaster Response Team and staff from the IFRC Water and Sanitation unit to set up a water treatment system in the village. The water treatment unit, which has the capacity to filter and store 10,000 litres of water at a time, will supply clean water to the 110 families living in the village in the months ahead.