When a community faces a crisis and needs humanitarian assistance, access to reliable information and trustworthy media is essential. Guaranteeing rights such as protection from harm, a place in a camp, healthcare, and food depends on the right of access to information.
However, with the widespread use of social networks and digital platforms, rumours and manipulation now spread like wildfire and give rise to a tide of harmful information, including about the work of aid organisations. This type of harmful information impacts first and foremost the people requiring aid: it can obstruct protective measures and impede access to the most vulnerable, and can sow doubt within communities about aid organisations’ neutrality.
Local media play a crucial role in this context. They can communicate concrete needs and questions from the population; provide a platform for community leaders to explain the aid available and how to access it; and enable aid workers to clarify the principles that guide their work. This dialogue fosters trust – trust that saves lives and empowers people to take control of their own destinies.
Though Fondation Hirondelle is not a humanitarian aid organisation, the journalistic work of its media and partner media outlets at the heart of crisis situations makes it an important ally for the aid sector. Its initiatives help to counter disinformation and the manipulation of public opinion, preventing them from hindering aid work or from increasing the suffering of the most vulnerable populations.
Caroline Vuillemin, General Director
This piece is taken from the 17th issue of Mediation, ‘Information: a humanitarian defence against hybrid warfare’, which you’ll find attached at the top of this article or here.