Red Cross opens expo in the Tavricheskiy

The International Committee of the Red Cross, with the support of the IPA CIS and the SPB Office of the Russian Red Cross set up a photo exposition to mark the 150 years of its humanitarian activities.

The expo in the Koupolnyi Hall features works of celebrated masters of photography. Vice President of the ICRC Christine Berley said: “With a total of 40 photos, the expo is designed to give an overview of our activities over the period of fifteen decades, including the latest developments an Syria. Their authors are not only celebrities but also our staff who came to be witnesses of dramatic events across the world”.

The expo tells stories across almost every war and conflict from the late 18th century onwards showing through the eye of a photographer, the pain and grief, yet also courage and humanity.

The official function on the occasion was attended by the Head of the SPB Office of the Russian Red Cross Tatyana Liniova and Deputy Secretary General of the IPA CIS Secretariat Sergey Kourdin who said in his congratulatory address: “The contribution of the ICRC to the challenges of the IPA CIS in the consolidation and harmonization of national laws in the CIS is hard to overestimate. It is by no means a random fact that the expo has been deployed in the Tavricheskiy Palace. Out relations with the ICRC are modulated into the timeframe: it is the 15th year of our bilateral cooperation”.

Russian regional office of the ICRC is engaged with the IPA CIS through the work of IPA CIS Permanent Commissions, namely the Commission on Social Policy and the Commission on Science, Education and Legal Affairs since 1997, which led to the adoption of a set of model laws and recommendations related to the implementation of international humanitarian law in the national legal frameworks throughout the CIS.