CAMPAIGN UPDATE
We did it! Thanks to your overwhelming response, more than one billion messages of hope and good deeds were shared on World Humanitarian Day. Click here to read more about the campaign.
World Humanitarian Day
World Humanitarian Day is celebrated on 19 August - the date on which a brutal attack on UN headquarters in Baghdad in 2003 killed 22 people, including UN envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello.
The Day honours humanitarians of all guises: those who have dedicated their lives to helping others, those who bring relief to people around the world, those who make a difference within their communities, and those who have paid the highest price for their service.
It is also an opportunity to remember those in need. Every day, millions of people go to sleep hungry, without shelter or protection, as a result of disasters both natural and manmade. Humanitarian workers strive to provide life-saving assistance and long-term rehabilitation to affected individuals and communities, regardless of where or who they are.
Everyone can be a humanitarian
While aid workers come from all over the world, most are from the country in which they work. Ordinary people affected by disasters are often the first to help their own communities.
This year's World Humanitarian Day invites us all to become humanitarians.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has launched a campaign asking people to do something good on 19 August - anything from helping a neighbour with their shopping to volunteering for a local organisation to supporting international relief efforts.
Singer Beyoncé Knowles, who is fronting the campaign, has donated her song "I Was Here", which she performed at the UN earlier this month. The video will premiere globally on 19 August.
Do something!
You can register your act of good on the website: www.whd‑iwashere.org
You may feel that it is too small to make a real difference but remember that you will be joining millions of others like you. Together, your acts represent a powerful force for good.
As Ban Ki-moon says in his message for World Humanitarian Day: "collectively [your actions] will reverberate around the world, generating unstoppable momentum for a better future.
