Red Cross Red Crescent magazine 
Even before conflict broke out in Iraq and Syria, people in the Middle East were suffering from severe water shortages as the past few years’ rising violence and record low rainfall have made access to an adequate quantity and quality of water increasingly difficult, according to a recent report by the ICRC.
In the north-eastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri, the epicentre of fighting between Boko Haram and the Nigerian army, the scale of humanitarian needs and the horrific mental scars and physical injuries the violence is leaving on the population are appalling.