World Humanitarian Day

This year’s Aid Worker Security Report comes at a major inflection point for international humanitarian assistance and during an alarming new peak of violence against humanitarians. The 2025 edition – our 15th since data tracking began – was almost not produced after the Aid Worker Security Database (AWSD), lost its US government funding when the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) was dismantled. The funding crisis now rocking the sector comes on top of escalating conflicts and a steep erosion of respect for humanitarian norms and the laws of war by state actors – amplified in some places by public smear campaigns against aid organisations. The conflicts in Gaza and Sudan continue to drive the greatest numbers of aid worker casualties, but incidents were on the rise in other contexts as well, with historically high numbers seen in Burkina Faso, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Lebanon, Nigeria, Somalia, Ukraine, and Yemen. The loss of funding, security...

  A continuing surge in violence  Attacks against aid workers continued to climb steeply in 2024 (and in the first half of 2025), along with the number of victims and deaths. The AWSD recorded an all-time high of 568 major violent incidents against aid workers (killings, kidnappings, and woundings) in 2024 – a 36% increase over 2023. It was the second consecutive year to set records for both the number of victims and fatalities, which rose by 37% and 31% respectively. Major violent incidents occurred in 40 countries in 2024, an increase from 33 in 2023. When arrests and detentions by state authorities are included, the number of countries rises to 42, underscoring both the geographic spread of insecurity and the growing role of state actors in obstructing humanitarian operations.  The violence showed no signs of letting up in the first half of 2025. As at 30 June, the provisional data suggests the numbers are on track to break records again, barring dramatic shifts in the...

  Humanitarian access, operational security, and resourcing are all inseparably linked. For that reason, the record-setting levels of violence against aid workers in 2024, followed by the unprecedented US funding freeze in 2025, have created overlapping crises: loss of critical services for communities, heightened risks for aid workers , and erosion of the professional and data capacities that underpin safe and principled operations. The evidence gathered shows that the security risks emerging from programme cuts are not confined to high-profile conflict zones. They span contexts from Gaza to Colombia, with incidents ranging from community protests to targeted attacks on staff. In several cases, downsizing has left national aid actors exposed to disproportionate risk, while misinformation and weaponised narratives have further undermined acceptance. Without decisive action by donors and diplomatic actors , the current patterns point to a future where humanitarian aid operations ...