After 14 years of registering more than 35,000 people as missing, the International Red Cross can finally bring some solace to families on the fate and whereabouts of their missing loved ones in Syria. We sit down with the head of the Syria delegation, Stephan Sakalian, to talk about how the International Committee of the Red Cross is working to provide some consolation to those seeking missing loved ones and what it will take to rebuild the country under the new government. Follow us on X.com, ...
Jun 26, 2025•34 min•Season 2025Ep. 5
It’s been a challenging time to be part of a humanitarian organization in the U.S. The terms: foreign assistance aid and foreign aid have been discussed a lot lately. But, what do they really mean? Can humanitarian aid to help people affected by conflict and violence—the work we do at International Committee of the Red Cross—really meet an America-first agenda? On today’s episode, ICRC’s Head of the US & Canada Delegation Fabrizio Carboni sits down with Kathryn-Jean Lopez, editor-at-large at...
May 22, 2025•30 min•Season 2025Ep. 4
Since the beginning of time, war has been used as a tool to resolve disagreements. While countless numbers of civilians die in war, the cost of war only gets more expensive each year. In this episode, we look at one of the only programs on the globe that brings together adversaries and allies to talk through ways to reduce the costs of war—in treasure and in lives--and maybe build toward positive peace. We sit down with Thom Geiser, an armed services advisor with the ICRC, and Paul Sotomayor, th...
Apr 24, 2025•23 min•Season 2025Ep. 3
In this Digital Dilemmas 2.0: Deepfakes episode, we take a look at two poignant questions: “How do we distinguish truth from manipulation? Who owns the truth?“ We tour a deepfake exhibit created by the ICRC and L'École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) at the United Nations. Then, we zoom out and look at how dissemination of harmful narratives projected in images, videos, or other information affect communities in conflict and situations violence. See bonus materials, additional informat...
Mar 20, 2025•21 min•Season 2025Ep. 1
In a country of more than 100 armed groups, the Democratic Republic of Congo has one of the most protracted and forgotten conflicts in the world. In the latest Intercross episode, we ask what the recent hostilities that started around December mean for the more than 4.5 million people who have been forced to flee their homes? And what is the ICRC’s response? In this episode, we hear from Francois Moreillon, ICRC's Head of Delegation in Kinshasa, the capital of the DRC. Please rate, review, and s...
Feb 20, 2025•20 min•Season 2025Ep. 1
We'll be back soon with new episodes. For now please like, follow, rate, review, and subscribe to Intercross wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow us on X @ICRC_dc Subscribe to our newsletter so you never miss an episode. See archived episodes, bonus materials, and additional information on our website ....
Feb 03, 2025•36 sec
In 2017, a battle raged in Mosul, as Iraqi armed forces and their international supporters fought to dislodge Islamic State fighters from the city. Almost 2 million people—half of Mosul’s population--fled from the fighting. During the battle, over 9000 civilians were killed and more than 130,000 homes were destroyed or damaged. In the latest episode, we hear from the staff at one of the hospitals decimated by the fighting. Then we turn to our team in Mosul and ask: How do largely populated citie...
Mar 28, 2024•20 min•Season 2024Ep. 5
Following the end of the Islamic State Group’s caliphate in Mosul, Iraq in 2017, hundreds of women and children were detained in facilities throughout Iraq and Syria, and left in a state of limbo, not knowing when or if they would be released and repatriated into third-party countries. In this episode, we meet one family that has at least partly managed to leave detention and the war behind them to find a home in the Kyrgyz Republic with the help of their host community. We then speak to Elena E...
Feb 15, 2024•22 min•Season 2023Ep. 4
While media images showed the initial destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam leaving thousands of homes underwater and civilians without electricity or clean drinking water, it wasn’t able to show the unexploded ordnances lurking under the surface, affecting untold numbers of people. Today go to the Kherson Region, which has been heavily impacted unexploded ordnances, and hear from civilians and a Ukrainian Red Cross worker on the ground about how the contamination of landmines has frozen every da...
Jan 25, 2024•23 min•Season 2023Ep. 3
Today, we have an archived episode for you from last year called “Inside the Central Tracing Agency.” It’s a 150-year-old division of the ICRC that today is a crucial resource for families searching for loved ones gone missing due to conflict, violence, natural disasters, or along the migration route. We hope to be back in the New Year with all new episodes for you. So stayed tuned and enjoy! See bonus materials and additional information on our website . Subscribe to our newsletter so you never...
Dec 14, 2023•25 min
The level of armed violence in Haiti—akin to what we see in areas of conflict around the world—has had a direct and devastating impact on the population living in and around the capital of Port-au-Prince. For about the last two years, these neighborhoods have been living under protracted armed violence and suffer from the absence of basic services like safe drinking water, and emergency healthcare. In this episode, we hear from a Haitian Red Cross volunteer about their work on an ambulance servi...
Nov 16, 2023•13 min•Season 2023Ep. 2
TRIGGER WARNING: This episode contains sounds of an explosion and may be disturbing to some listeners. Digital dilemmas surrounding internet connectivity, artificial intelligence, and data surveillance are becoming more ubiquitous in our everyday lives as technology advances. It’s difficult to keep pace with those changes. But now picture yourself with one of these digital dilemmas in the midst of an armed conflict or other situation of violence anywhere in the world. This week on the podcast, h...
Oct 19, 2023•28 min•Season 2023Ep. 1
Welcome to the 2022 season of the International Committee of the Red Cross’s Intercross: The Podcast. If you’re new to the podcast, our goal is to delve into the rules of war and takes you to the frontlines of some of the most inaccessible conflicts in the world, where the ICRC and the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement work to neutrally and independently respond to emergencies. Subscribe to our newsletter so you never miss an episode. See bonus materials and additional information on our website ....
Jan 31, 2023•2 min
In this episode, we learn about the Ubumwe Community Center in Gisenyi, Rwanda, their motto, “disability is not inability,” and the importance of inclusion, especially in communities affected by violence. We first hear from one of the center’s student musicians about how the center’s music program has given him opportunities to perform for others. We then turn to Subhash Sinha, the ICRC’s Physical Rehabilitation Program Manager for east Africa to hear about our work providing prosthetics and ort...
Dec 08, 2022•11 min•Season 2022Ep. 127
Intense hostilities in Yemen have raged for more than seven years. The needs are severe and deepen by the minute with more than two-thirds of Yemen’s people in need of humanitarian assistance. All, while essential services are on the brink of collapse and people are losing hope as the conflict appears to drag endlessly. In these past decades, the ICRC has been providing a wide array of humanitarian assistance including support to hospitals, improving access to clean water, and food parcels and r...
Nov 29, 2022•18 min•Season 2022Ep. 126
Following the change of government in August 2021, most of the health workers in Afghanistan were no longer getting paid. Medicines were no longer available, and many health professionals deserted the country’s hospitals in search of incomes. As a result, patients were sometimes refused access to treatment and the overall healthcare system in the country was on the verge of coming to a full stop. In this episode, we ask, what does the future of sustainable healthcare look like for millions of Af...
Oct 25, 2022•18 min•Season 2022Ep. 125
Prolonged drought, conflict, global inflation, and now a shortage of grain due to the Ukraine conflict. Somalia is particularly hard hit. Over 7 million people are in urgent need of food and water—that’s half the country’s population and equal to the populations of Los Angeles and Chicago, combined. The numbers are unfathomable. They represent millions of human stories and life experiences that don’t make headlines. Despite all of this, the ICRC has been addressing food insecurity for decades in...
Oct 12, 2022•17 min•Season 2022Ep. 124
Almost 40 years after the Falkland Islands/Malvinas conflict, we look back on the ICRC’s efforts to identify unknown soldiers. Figuring who these unknown soldiers were took decades to resolve. But in 2012, the ICRC received a request from the Argentine government to help identify their remains. Then in 2016 with the ICRC as a neutral intermediary, Argentina and the UK negotiated and signed an agreement known as the Humanitarian Project Plan. The crucial work of exhuming the graves and identifyin...
Sep 20, 2022•20 min•Season 2022Ep. 124
In this episode, we tell the story of the more than 150-year-old Central Tracing Agency, a division of the ICRC that today is a crucial resource for families searching for loved ones gone missing due to conflict, violence, natural disasters, or along the migration route. We take you for a trip back in time to the foundations of the CTA in 1860 to understand how this history has made it what it is today. You’ll hear from Geneva Tour Guide Catherine Hubert Girod and ICRC Historian Daniel Palmieri ...
Sep 13, 2022•24 min•Season 2022Ep. 122
In this episode, we’re going to learn about how the ICRC works with what are known in Mexico as, colectivos, or groups of families and friends who unite to search for their missing loved ones and defend their rights. We speak with Beatriz Adriana Martinez about her husband, Juan Alvarez Gil’s disappearance in 2013, to understand what a family goes through when a loved one goes missing and how these colectivos support Beatriz and the hundreds of thousands of other families. We also speak with Mar...
Aug 30, 2022•21 min•Season 2022Ep. 121
This mini episode kick starts the 2022 season of Intercross: The Podcast. In this episode, we rewind the tape and listen to an interview with Florence Anselmo, Head of the Central Tracing Agency, a division of the ICRC that's been a crucial resource for families affected by conflict, disaster, and other situations of violence to restore contact with their loved ones. Florence helps break down what the agency does and why it's crucial to the work of the ICRC. See bonus materials and additional in...
Aug 26, 2022•6 min
More than 10 years of brutal conflict in Syria has left most of the population in need of assistance and without access to basic services in places all over the country. In part one of our special series on Syria, Intercross heard the stories of two Syrians living in Aleppo, Mouna Shawakh and Rami Asfar, in their own words. In part two, we zoom into Northeast Syria, in a camp called Al Hol. Today Al Hol houses around 58,000 people -- two thirds of whom are children, and most under the age of 5. ...
Dec 29, 2021•25 min•Season 2021Ep. 120
After 10 years of conflict in Syria, thousands of people are missing, hundreds of thousands are dead, and millions of people are displaced. In the past 12 months, millions more Syrians have been pushed into deeper hunger and poverty. In Northeast Syria, we’re seeing the world’s most complex child protection crisis unfolding in front of us. In two special episodes, Intercross shares stories of those affected by a decade of brutal and unrelenting conflict, and the efforts made by the ICRC and our ...
Dec 22, 2021•2 min•Season 2021Ep. 119
After 10 years of conflict in Syria, thousands of people are missing, hundreds of thousands are dead, and millions of people are displaced. The past 12 months has seen millions more Syrians pushed into deeper hunger and poverty. For young people especially, this has been a decade of savage loss, marked by missed milestones, stolen futures, immense economic hardship and a profound psychological toll. In this episode, Intercross brings you part one of a special two-part series, hearing directly fr...
Dec 16, 2021•19 min•Season 2021Ep. 118
Long after returning home to the US, a staggering number of veterans suffer from untreated depression, PTSD, trauma and other mental health conditions, which in some cases, run deep. A connection is unclear, but some of these veterans also become incarcerated and must learn to cope with these issues behind bars. The American Red Cross is seeking to help them through a resiliency program that sends trained facilitators into prisons to provide mental health support to incarcerated veterans. For th...
Dec 02, 2021•17 min
World leaders have converged on the Scottish city of Glasgow for COP26—the United Nations climate change conference. The stakes could not be higher. Sea levels are rising. Heatwaves, droughts, floods, and wildfires are more frequent, more intense, and threatening the survival of humanity. In a brand-new episode of Intercross, we hear from our communications colleague in London, Sam Smith, who’s been closely following this story for the past year, writing about the very real human impacts of clim...
Nov 04, 2021•19 min•Season 2021Ep. 116
Digital technologies – both their presence and absence during crises – are impacting humanitarian action and civilians’ lives. They are also impacting the means and method of warfare - leading to a “digitalization of armed conflicts”. In this podcast, Intercross host Elizabeth Rushing speaks with Saman Rejali, ICRC Law and Policy Advisor based in Geneva, and Yannick Heiniger, Deputy CEO of swissnex San Francisco, on their views about digital technologies and humanitarianism, exiting the echo-cha...
Jun 08, 2021•28 min•Season 2021Ep. 115
The average time that the ICRC has been present in its ten largest operations is 42 years. With these seemingly endless wars come layers of humanitarian consequences, including the cumulative effects of hostilities on infrastructure and healthcare systems, prolonged displacement, increased barriers to accessing essential services, and interruptions to education. The duration of humanitarian operations in protracted conflict settings has caused organizations like the ICRC to re-think their way of...
Mar 11, 2021•30 min•Season 2021Ep. 114
Contemporary crises and armed conflicts are increasingly complex, with humanitarian needs made even more acute by the protracted and urban nature of conflicts, the challenges of influencing the behavior of warring parties, and the crippling effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. With 20,000 staff present in 104 countries, the ICRC is mandated by the international community, through the Geneva Conventions and its Additional Protocols, to assist and protect people affected by armed conflict and violenc...
Feb 17, 2021•33 min
The COVID-19 pandemic has turned nearly every aspect of society on its head. Law enforcement agencies and services play a crucial role in their countries and communities supporting national authorities in various ways, including to control the disease alongside their normal daily duties of serving and protecting their communities. In this podcast, Intercross host Elizabeth Rushing speaks with Calum McDonald, ICRC’s Regional Delegate for Relations with Police and Security Forces, and Maciej Polko...
Feb 12, 2021•21 min•Season 2021Ep. 113
