Humanitarian Disaster Quotes

The deplorable Syrian refugee crisis was created because Syrian President Bashar al-Assad started a war on his people, and the international community refused to confront him.

This year marks 20 years since the Rwandan genocide -- the world's greatest humanitarian tragedy of the late 20th century. The international community had pledged 'never again' in the aftermath of the genocide in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda in the 1990s. Yet, we are witnessing today a different type of humanitarian disaster unfolding in Syria and Iraq.

We've got a very difficult situation created by this embrace of the so-called Arab Spring. And that's not getting better. It's getting worse. The carnage for the people of Syria is horrific, and it's quite frankly too little, too late to reverse a lot of that.

A war is going to destroy our economy even further. It's going to be a threefold humanitarian disaster.

One man's death: that is a catastrophe. A hundred thousand dead: that is a statistic

Syria has become the great tragedy of the century—a disgraceful humanitarian calamity with suffering and displacement unparalleled in recent history.

What we are talking about is extended world war...People would move on a massive scale. Hundreds of millions, probably billions of people would have to move.

Fidel Castro has killed more people than we even know …. Fidel Castro uses medicine and food to suppress his people.

In the pandemonium of the crisis in New Orleans, somehow getting people on busses took priority over keeping them alive.

I was proud to witness American Jewish organizations found the Save Darfur Coalition in June 2004 to mobilize a coordinated interfaith response to the ongoing humanitarian disaster.

I'm sickened by the way that the delivery of so-called humanitarian aid is once again being used as a justification — or cover — for war.

As the refugees stream north history is going to assign you folks [liberals] the role of pallbearers at the funeral of freedom in Central America.

Nobody's interests are served by what's happening in Syria today. It's a catastrophe. It's the worst human catastrophe since World War II. And, as I said just now, it represents a failure of the entire international community to come to grips with solving it.

What's going on in Syria is the worst humanitarian crisis since World War II. And we are punishing those who are suffering most in this circumstance, in this condition. We vet refugees from Syria for a period of 18 to 24 months before they're allowed to come to the United States. And, you know, if you will permit me, I think we know more about them by the time they get here than we know about the president's finances.

There is never a humanitarian solution for a humanitarian crisis. The solutions for the humanitarian crisis are always political ones.

Every chance at destabilizing [Bashar] Assad... the bombing campaign causes a flood of refugees into Jordan, there's already half a million in Jordan. I think a bombing campaign - I think it's hard to argue that a U.S. bombing campaign is going to cause less refugees. And I think it causes more refugees and more of a humanitarian disaster. I think it causes, or allows, the risk of Israel being attacked with a gas attack to go up, if we attack Assad. So there's all kinds of bad things.

I'll absolutely do safe zones in Syria for the people. I think that Europe has made a tremendous mistake by allowing these millions of people to go into Germany and various other countries. And all you have to do is take a look. It's a disaster what's happening over there.

If global warming is not contained, the West will face a choice of a refugee crisis of unimaginable proportions, or direct complicity in crimes against humanity.

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

The notion that aid can alleviate systemic poverty, and has done so, is a myth. Millions in Africa are poorer today because of aid; misery and poverty have not ended but increased. Aid has been, and continues to be, an unmitigated political, economic, and humanitarian disaster for most parts of the developing world.

The U.S.' refusal to acknowledge the plight of displaced Haitians and maintaining inhumane practices of neglect, disrespect, and violence amounts to a gross violation of human rights.

Up until the end of the Bush Administration, there was indifference to the North Korean suffering under Kim Jong-Il.

In all disputes, a point is arrived at where no party, no matter how right or wrong it might have been at the start of that dispute, will any longer be totally in the right or totally in the wrong. Such a point I believe, has been reached in this debate... Let us not equivocate. A tragedy of unprecedented proportions is unfolding in Africa.

In their greatest hour of need, the world failed the people of Rwanda.

Our actions to overthrow secular dictators in Iraq and Libya, and attempts now to do the same in Syria, have resulted in tremendous loss of life, failed nations, and even worse humanitarian crises while strengthening the very terrorist organizations that have declared war on America.