PETER MAURER

While the nature of warfare is changing and wars are moving into cities, they are also becoming longer and their consequences more impactful.

Trust into leadership evaporates with communities when they see that their problems are not adequately addressed, neither at the national level nor at the international arena.

Urbanisation, poverty, youth unemployment are leading to violence-prone cities.

The mess in the world is a strong driver because, at the end of the day, it's the increasing unacceptability of the divergences and rifts in the world economically, socially, politically, and culturally which lead everybody to say, 'We have to do something.'

Experience shows that the reliance on illegal, immoral, and inhumane interrogation techniques is universally a very poor choice.

It has always been clear that any use of nuclear weapons would have catastrophic humanitarian consequences.

Torture can destroy the social fabric of communities, degrade a society's institutions, and undermine the integrity of its political systems.

The young, the old, women, the disabled, the sick and the wounded are entitled to protection under international law. Too often, the ICRC's calls for those laws to be respected are ignored.

Conflicts are increasingly causing devastation in densely populated urban centres rather than open battlefields, creating a host of new problems through the cumulative impact from the destruction of vital services like water and electricity.

Short-termism is no longer an option. We have to envisage humanitarian action with a medium- and long-term perspective.

Can you really send back people to where they are fleeing from?

We demonize our enemies at our own peril.

Economic activity can help repair war-torn societies, but if it's not conducted responsibly, it can also create or prolong violence. Companies and international organisations must help strengthen communities and overcome the trauma of violence.

While conflicts have expanded and deepened and transformed, actors have transformed, and humanitarian assistance is transforming. Protection work is transforming and taking on another character.

The principal cause of suffering during humanitarian crises is insufficient respect of applicable rules of international humanitarian law.

Not enough countries, not enough armies, not enough armed groups are abiding by the fundamental human values enshrined in the Geneva Conventions.

The humanitarian ecosystem is diverse - not only is there a variety of traditional humanitarian actors, but the system should also embrace an increasing diversity of private sector actors.

Concrete steps are needed to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in military plans, doctrines, and policies.

I think we are challenged in how we define humanitarian action today and how we relate to long-term needs. We are also confronted with legitimate expectations from the people who want us to respond far more thoroughly to their basic pleas than we would have done in a much more contained form of conflict.

We still have a strong commitment to our original mission, which is to protect and assist people who are suffering from the impact of violence, but the violence has changed its character, format, and pattern so that we are now responding year after year.

There is a clear business case for building the resilience and capacity of local communities, businesses, and institutions because a peaceful, educated, and productive population will stimulate economic growth in the long term.

Ensuring the respect of international humanitarian law and principles is one of the key areas necessary to establish accountability chains.

Businesses operating in fragile or conflict-affected environments bear a responsibility to, at the very minimum, do no harm and avoid fuelling conflict or reinforcing fragility.

You don't torture people. You don't indiscriminately attack civilians. You protect as good as you can the impact of your warfare on women and children.

We live in an environment in which connectivity and cyberspace are transforming all workplaces, including the humanitarian workplace.