How long have you been working in the field of emergency operations and which crises have you responded to?
I have worked in emergency operations for nearly 20 years, initially with CARE UK in London seeking funding and monitoring emergency projects in Somalia, Iraq, Sudan, Afghanistan and Ethiopia. After, I joined CARE Afghanistan for five years (between 1999 and 2004), and later CARE Sudan to support the Darfur crisis. In mid-2005, I was transferred to Sri Lanka to support the tsunami response for over two years and then to Indonesia to complete our tsunami operation in Aceh. Since 2009, I have been working in CARE International’s office in Geneva as Head of Emergency Operations and have been deployed to Haiti, Pakistan, and the Horn of Africa. Recently I have been working full-time on the Syria regional crisis.
How does the Syria crisis compare to other crises that you responded to?
Each emergency and humanitarian situation affects you – especially when your colleagues and friends are deeply and individually impacted by the crisis. A few memories:
Receiving various telephone calls from scared CARE female staff stuck at the Pakistan border trying desperately to leave Afghanistan ahead of likely bombing after 9/11. Other key staff remaining in Kabul putting their lives at risk as they organised a rapid distribution of wheat flour to 10,000 widows.
Sitting in camps for displaced people in Darfur with hundreds of thousands of people waiting for their next meal – us wondering about the future as we urgently tried to secure funding to keep vital food and water flowing.
Listening to story after story from staff who were at the coast in Sri Lanka on the day of the tsunami – what happened, what they did, how they felt.
And Aceh, where despite the total devastation by the tsunami, the region changed from one in the midst of conflict to one focused on reconstruction and peace.
The Syria crisis is similar to other emergencies, in terms of the huge humanitarian needs and stretched resources. CARE has offices and programmes supporting refugee work in Egypt, Lebanon and Jordan. The situation for the now over 1.6 million refugees is tragic and difficult – more than 77 per cent of the refugees live outside of camps desperately trying to find shelter and funding to support their children and other family members.
I also reflect on what life is like for those Syrians who haven’t fled Syria: the elderly, the poor, widows without male relatives for support – I wonder how these, some of the most vulnerable Syrians, are surviving, many remaining in the midst of a conflict zone. Without CARE yet having access to these vulnerable people in Syria, and with the conflict intensifying, we must keep questioning how CARE, humanitarian organisations and the international community, can do more to allow Syrians to again sleep peacefully in their homes at night. CARE does not currently have staff in Syria, but is committed to providing assistance, and is exploring ways to address urgent humanitarian needs despite serious access and security challenges to working in the country.
As we approach World Refugee Day this week let’s also please remember those vulnerable Syrians who are not refugees, many of whom will be frightened, abandoned and hungry.
How is CARE responding?
To date CARE has supported over 110,000 refugees who have left Syria – we are working with some of the poorest refugees in Jordan, and are now also working in Lebanon, Egypt. We support refugees in urban towns and together with other agencies will be supporting a new refugee camp to be opened during the coming months in Jordan.
Learn more about how CARE is assisting Syrian refugees
About Sally Austin
Sally Austin is CARE International’s Head of Emergency Operations. She has worked in emergency operations for nearly 20 years initially with CARE UK, seeking funding and monitoring emergency projects in Somalia, Iraq, Sudan, Afghanistan and Ethiopia. She has worked and managed large-scale humanitarian responses in Afghanistan, Darfur, the Horn of Africa, Sri Lanka and Indonesia for the tsunami response, Haiti, and Pakistan, and is currently coordinating CARE’s Syria regional crisis response.