Three weeks ago a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon shook the world. Since then we have struggled to come to grips with images of devastation, suffering and grief which will forever be engraved on our collective memory. But there are also other images that permeate this tragedy, like a shaft of light: the sight of the volunteers who rushed to places of destruction to offer their help. Read

Bonn, Germany/Stockholm, Sweden: The Swedish telecommunications corporation Ericsson has donated 280 mobile phones to the Bonn-based United Nations Volunteers programme (UNV) to help increase security of personnel in relief operations worldwide. Read

Maputo, Mozambique: Once we arrived in Maputo we picked up our luggage quickly set off towards the flooded Limpopo Valley. The trip was impressive, as the outskirts of Maputo were full of rainwater that could not be drained. Read

Bonn, Germany: It was a turbulent year for Kosovo. Following drawn-out civil strife and weeks of air strikes, Kosovars faced the difficult task of rebuilding their lives. Many had lost loved ones and everything else they cherished. Institutions, law and order and basic infrastructure were left in shambles. UN Volunteers accompanied the people on their first steps down a long road to recovery. Read

Bonn, Germany: Tim Brown, a British education adviser for UNHCR Uganda since 1992, briefed UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata on 9 July in Geneva in connection with an earlier mission the UN Volunteer undertook to Ghana. Read

Bonn, Germany: The UNV programme, with the support of the German and the Japanese Governments, has been able to provide some refugees and internally displaced persons with an opportunity to return to Bosnia as National UN Volunteers. Since 1997 well over 200 of them have worked as NUNVs to help with the postwar rehabilitation of their country. Their efforts help make the peace hold. Read

Bonn, Germany: One of Rwanda's main priorities - and also one of its great challenges - is the reinsertion of some two million refugees and displaced persons (most of them widows and orphans) into the country's socio-economic life. To aid in this delicate and crucial process, 13 UNV field workers are working since early 1997 in 5 Rwandan prefectures. Read

Kibungo, Rwanda: 37-year old Jeff Crook works as a UNV with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Kibungo, Rwanda. He has been transferred temporarily to the emergency operation in Gihembe refugee camp in Byumba, where 14,000 Masisi refugees have been relocated. Read