"I wish I could go back to Syria but what would I find there? Has my home survived? Would I be able to find a job?" These worries are expressed by many Syrian refugees who knock at the door of UNHCR in Amman, Jordan, seven years after the war began in Syria. UN Volunteers Anja Ingabire and Apoorva Sharma support UNHCR’s Refugee Status Determination Unit, interviewing asylum seekers to determine whether they meet the legal criteria to be recognized as refugees according to the 1951 Refugee Convention, and therefore are in need of international protection.

I served as a UN Volunteer at the WHO Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean in Cairo, Egypt, from May 2016 until May 2017. This was a fantastic opportunity for me, both professionally and personally.

Sachiyo Miwa served as a UN Volunteer Associate Humanitarian Affairs Officer with OCHA in the Sudan under the Human Resource Development Programme for Peacebuilding and Development. During her assignment, Sachiyo gained critical oversight of the challenges actors face in delivering humanitarian response efforts. Sachiyo worked for the Coordination Support Section of OCHA, with a focus on assisting senior management in the preparation for Inter-Sector Coordination Group (ISCG) meetings and Humanitarian Country Team (HCT) meetings. 

UN Youth Volunteer Nour Hamayel is 26-years-old and has just completed a two-year assignment with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in her home country, the State of Palestine. As national UN Youth Volunteer, Nour’s primarily role was Y-PEER coordinator – facilitating conversations and activities in the State of Palestine on sexual and reproductive health and HIV prevention on behalf of the UNFPA-funded Youth Peer Education Network.

Millions of Yemenis are affected by a terrible armed conflict, an impending famine and one of the world's largest cholera outbreaks in recent history. In May 2018, over 7,5 million people were receiving emergency food assistance — more than twice the number of people reached over a year ago.

There are more than 240,000 refugees and asylum seekers currently registered with UNHCR Egypt. Many are women and children. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) provides registration, refugee status determination, and protection assistance to refugees and asylum seekers from 58 nationalities, in coordination with national and international NGOs.

Volunteerism, as a universal social behavior, is a critical resource for community resilience. Mutual aid, self-help, and reciprocity are important coping strategies for isolated and vulnerable communities.   In the absence of wider provisions and services, volunteers can help marginalized groups meet their needs.

The idea that UN Volunteers work only in humanitarian or relief fields is far from the truth. Julie – a 28-year-old volunteer – has been supporting a UNODC project aimed at developing forensic services in Palestine.

"I was born in Gaza and I have always lived in the Strip," Alaa explains. "I was aware of the situation that civilians are facing here, as I have experienced it in my daily life. But through my volunteering experience with OCHA, I became acquainted with a large amount of data, statistics, and reports that have deepened my knowledge of the problems affecting the Strip: from unemployment to the shortage of electricity, water, drugs, and so on."

For more than ten years, the African Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) has maintained a large-scale peacekeeping operation following years of civil war. The mission is unprecedented in its ever-evolving nature, due to challenges posed by the harsh desert conditions of West Sudan.