TWO Irish aid workers helping the world’s most vulnerable people have told the Irish Sun: “More than the population of Ireland has been displaced.”
Both Louise Foster and Ros O’Sullivan have dedicated their careers to helping people living in some of the worst climates on the planet.
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Louise works in Sudan, while Ros works in Ukraine and travels back and forth from his home in Ireland to oversee works there.
The charity Concern works towards long-term development as well as emergency and disaster operations, such as the war breaking out in Ukraine or the earthquake in Nepal in 2015.
Ros said Irish charities are often leading the way thanks to donations from home.
She said: “Ireland, as you probably know, has got a very strong reputation for punching above our weight when it comes to supporting agencies like Concern to intervene and to respond. Certainly, per capita, we’re one of the biggest donators in the world when it comes to this.”
Here Nicola Bardon speaks to Louise and Ros about their time working in some of the harshest places on earth.
LOUISE FOSTER
Operations Manager, Sudan
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AFTER a horse riding accident, Louise left her auditing job and applied to work at an Irish charity operating in Africa.
She said: “I barely knew where South Sudan was. I applied and that was 10 years ago. I have never looked back.”
Louise, who has also worked in Nigeria and other parts of Africa, is now an Operations Manager for Concern Wordwide.
Since April 2023, there has been a power struggle between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces for control of the country.
As of this month, the figures showed more than 20,000 dead and millions at risk of famine.
Louise was living and working in the country when the civil war broke out and had to be evacuated from the capital Khartoum.
She recalled: “I can’t explain the evacuation and the fear of not getting out alive was very real.
“And that was the first time in my 10 year career of feeling like that… It has been a very difficult year.”
LONG WAR
She added: “I never, ever once thought the day that I finally evacuated from Port Sudan, that this war would ever be going on this long. I left my apartment full of my stuff.
“But it’s going into 16 months.
“Some of the US officials have warned us that it’s going to be the worst famine since probably the 1980s in Ethiopia. Currently, it’s at the stage of the 2011 famine of Somalia.
“More than 25 million people face acute food insecurity and probably seven million have been internally displaced.”
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POPULATION OF IRELAND DISPLACED
“So that’s like the population of Ireland and some that have had to be displaced multiple times, not just once.”
Charities like Concern are on the ground with medical supplies, clean water, food and kits such as mosquito nets and solar lamps.
Louise said they support 90 clinics across the country, helping more than 11,000 malnourished children under the age of 15.
And she said many people may not even be aware of how bad it is in Sudan.
HUMANITARIAN CRISIS
She said: “I don’t like saying it’s a forgotten war because you’re highlighting the word forgotten. But when you think of Gaza, Ukraine, obviously, they’re getting the news. But Sudan is the largest humanitarian crisis on this planet at the minute, in terms of numbers and scale.”
Despite what they are going through, Louise said the locals are amazing.
She said: “If I thought about it too much, it’d probably bring a tear to my eye. The Sudanese people, they’re actually on the ground. And they’re just amazing. I cannot emphasise that enough.
“I can tip out to Ireland and go on my R&R and this, but like the Sudanese people, they’re actually on the ground.
‘EXTREME CONDITIONS’
“They come to work every day under extreme conditions. But the Sudanese people are, if anything, the most proudest and hospitable people I know. And they will just continue to support everyone and each other.”
Louise also praised the Irish who donate to causes like the situation in Sudan, saying they understand how a famine like what is happening now can affect a country.
The aid worker said: “I’m really proud of Concern and the fact that we continue to be there and continue to work.
“We have to be thankful the Irish Government in particular and all our other institutional donors.”
DONATIONS
She added: “There was a friend of my father’s that did a night in Loughnavalley. It was so sweet and heartfelt and it meant more to me than maybe the five million that we get from the US government to do a particular grant. it was really, really sweet.”
Louise said that any time anyone donates on the dedicated link on their website for Sudan, the money only goes to that country.
But she added: “Isn’t it sad to think that it’s happening at this day and age?
“I mean, you think about Live Aid for Ethiopia in the 80s. But it is happening now in Sudan.”
ROS O’SULLIVAN
Head of Emergency Operations at Concern Worldwide.
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DURING an emergency, Ros and a few team members are flown to the affected country to assess the impact on the population and evaluate the response from the humanitarian community.
Concern is part of an EU collective called Alliance 2015, collaborating with other NGOs across Europe.
He said everything happens very quickly when an emergency breaks out, and then they look at what they need immediately, then in the next three months.
When the Russians invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Ros said they assumed “international diplomacy is going to prevail” and Putin wouldn’t attempt it.
But Ros, who was on a family holiday at the time, was instructed to head to Dublin Airport and fly to Ukraine.
BORDER BASES
Initially they were based at the main borders from Ukraine, including Poland, Hungary and Moldova.
Having not worked in Ukraine before, Concern had to get registered to legally work there and set up all the systems.
Within a couple of weeks of the invasion, they were working in the country and focused on those who were still there but displaced from their homes.
He said: “There was, at one point, something like five and a half million people on the move inside Ukraine. It’s incredible numbers.”
Collective centres were housing thousands of people, in what had been schools or clinics.
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UNKNOWN SCENARIO
Ros said: “Nobody knew what was going to happen – was this all going to be over in a week or a month or six weeks?”
Concern set up a joint programme with one of their alliance partners, Welthungerhilfe, from Germany and it is estimated by the end of this year, they will have spent €50million in Ukraine.
They assist in a myriad of ways, ranging from helping people pay rent and bills, to supporting small and medium sized business owners affected by the conflict.
This year, they have been planning for winter and running a psychosocial support programme for children.
HARSH WEATHER
It can drop to minus 20 in the winter, and the Russians often target electricity and utilities, which often don’t get fixed.
He said: “All they need to do is knock out the electricity, the flow of electricity around the country, and that will deprive people, especially in the cities of electricity, heat and water. And if you can imagine, an elderly couple living on the 15th floor of an apartment complex with no lift, no water, no light and no heat in minus 20 degrees.”
This year, they have been planning for this winter season and learning from the two that have passed since the start of the invasion.
They also have been running psychosocial support programmes where they are based to give children a chance to play with other kids, as many have not psychically been in schools since the pandemic.
KIDS TRAUMATISED
He revealed: “The children are very traumatised, not just about what they’re seeing and what they’ve been witnessing themselves and been in bunkers for very long periods of time, but also at this stage, every family in Ukraine has been touched by somebody dying, you know, a dad, an uncle, a cousin or more so in many cases.
“So they’re very, very impacted and very, very traumatised. But it was recognised that one of the most beneficial things we could do was providing mechanisms whereby kids could actually play together. Safely in an environment which is actually physically not safe.”
Ros has been working for almost 30 years in this field and said people often ask him how he would compare Ukraine to Gaza or other crises.
“I always tell people that the worst crisis is the next one, because every single time you have to start from scratch.”