By Lilian Elena Godoy
Like millions of people around the world, I cannot begin my day without a good cup of coffee. As I enjoy it, I usually read and watch the news; lately, I must admit, little of it is encouraging. It is striking to think that this small daily ritual connects us with a vast part of humanity: more than two billion cups of coffee are consumed every day around the world, according to media reports.
But while millions of us begin the day with this routine, in other parts of the world millions of people begin and end their day amid war, displacement, hunger, destruction and uncertainty. The contrast should be impossible for any of us to ignore.
The world is not facing a single war. It is facing a convergence of conflicts that connect with one another, cross borders and erode mechanisms of restraint that for decades helped prevent a greater catastrophe. During the 28th Humanitarian Affairs Segment of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), held in June 2026, participants referred to 65 active wars and conflicts, the highest number since the Second World War. More than 117 million people have been forced to leave their homes and, in 2026, an estimated 239 million will require humanitarian assistance, following a 2025 marked by drastic cuts in humanitarian operations and extraordinary levels of violence against those providing aid. Wars such as those in Sudan, Gaza and Ukraine have displaced millions of people and continue to claim countless civilian lives.
Yet because of declining resources, the humanitarian system can aim to reach 135 million people and has had to concentrate its most urgent response on 87 million.
Sudan perhaps represents the most brutal expression of this reality. After three years of war, the United Nations describes it as the world’s largest humanitarian and displacement crisis. Nearly 34 million people need assistance; millions have been forced from their homes, while hunger, malnutrition, sexual violence and the collapse of health services continue to spread. Yet Sudan remains far too often absent from international headlines. Not because its tragedy has ended, but because the world seems to have exhausted its capacity to look at several tragedies at the same time.
In Europe, the war between Russia and Ukraine continues to destroy homes, energy infrastructure and entire communities. In 2026, some 10.8 million people inside Ukraine need humanitarian assistance and protection, while millions remain displaced. But there is also another dimension that we cannot normalize: this war involves a nuclear power and is unfolding amid increasingly strategic rhetoric, the modernization of arsenals and the deterioration of international arms-control mechanisms.
In the Middle East, the situation has become even more complex since the escalation that began on 28 February 2026. Since then, the region has gone through fragile ceasefires, renewed hostilities and repeated diplomatic efforts to prevent the confrontation from returning to a large-scale open war. The UN Secretary-General has repeatedly warned that a new escalation would have catastrophic consequences for the peoples of the region, for international peace and security, and for the global economy.
And while new crises dominate the headlines, Gaza risks being pushed into the background. Not because the suffering has ended. In July 2026, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) described the humanitarian situation in Gaza as critical: most of the population remained displaced, military operations continued, and restrictions on movement and difficulties in accessing food, water, shelter and health services persisted. A humanitarian tragedy does not end when we stop talking about it.
These conflicts can no longer be analysed as isolated events. They compete for humanitarian resources, interrupt the transport of food and medicine, increase energy prices, disrupt trade routes and weaken international law. The Gulf war has demonstrated this with particular clarity. During the most intense moments of the crisis, commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz fell from around 95 vessels a day to almost zero, according to United Nations reports.
Against this backdrop of regional uncertainty, on 7 August Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and Pakistan signed a joint defence agreement in Mecca. Its central clause establishes that an armed attack against one of the three countries will be considered an attack against all. The signatory governments present it as a mechanism of collective deterrence and strengthened defence cooperation, not directed against any particular country. Strategically, however, its significance goes further: it can be read as an effort by regional powers to reduce their vulnerability, gain greater autonomy in security matters and prepare for an environment in which traditional alliances and balances are changing rapidly. The agreement does not prove that a regional war is inevitable, but it does reveal the extent to which states are reorganising in response to the risk of further escalation.
It is in this context that we arrive at 19 August, World Humanitarian Day. On that day, we honour the women and men who go precisely where so many others are trying to escape: into the rubble, overwhelmed hospitals, displacement camps, communities without water, and places where hunger has become yet another consequence of war.
But today, even those who deliver aid need protection. In April 2026, United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher told the Security Council that more than 1,010 humanitarian workers had been killed between 2023 and 2025, nearly three times the number recorded during the previous three years.
That is why commemorating World Humanitarian Day in 2026 requires much more than thanking those on the front lines for their courage. It means recognising that we cannot continue sending humanitarian personnel, again and again, to contain the consequences of political decisions that could have been prevented.
The June ECOSOC meeting gave precise language to this dilemma. The humanitarian system can and must reform: simplify structures, reduce duplication, strengthen accountability, work more closely with communities and make better use of increasingly scarce resources. But the meeting itself left a warning that should guide this commemoration: adaptation alone cannot replace political responsibility.
That responsibility belongs, first and foremost, to states and parties to conflict: to respect international humanitarian law, protect civilians and humanitarian personnel, facilitate access to those in need, and sustain sufficient and predictable financing.
This reflection takes on an even deeper meaning in August, the month in which the world remembers Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Eighty-one years later, those cities continue to remind us that there is a limit beyond which no reform, no convoy and no field hospital can provide an adequate response. Humanitarian action can adapt to scarcity; it cannot adapt to annihilation.
That is why 19 August should not be only a day to honour those who run towards the places others are trying to escape. It should also be a call to responsibility for those who have the power to prevent such places from continuing to multiply. In a fragmented world, humanitarian action continues to demonstrate that collective action is possible; but humanitarian workers cannot substitute for the political courage, diplomacy and respect for law that make prevention possible.
The question, then, is not only whether aid will arrive. It is whether we will be capable of acting before it is too late.
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