Caregivers Victimized

Misinformation about the Order of Malta puts the lives of volunteers offering humanitarian assistance in grave danger, said the Orders grandmaster. From Zenit:

In his traditional New Year's address, Fra' Andrew Bertie spoke Tuesday with the diplomatic corps accredited to the order, giving an overview of the organization's service to the poor and sick in 2007. He lamented "confusions created by the media, careless of verifying their sources," which he said can have "mortal consequences."..

Fra' Bertie explained to the diplomatic corps the disaster-relief assistance the order gave in Peru, Burkina Faso, the Dominican Republic and Mexico. He then turned his attention to the new health service activities begun in 2007. The list included the neonatal center added to the maternity hospital in Bethlehem, which delivers some 300 babies a month, 70% of whom are born to Muslim parents. The group also began eight dispensaries in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya, with projections to have 36 in the area within five years. In Russia, the grandmaster explained, the order's services work in conjunction with the Orthodox Church.

Fra' Bertie expressed his dismay at recent complications for the order..."The humanitarian workers on the ground, among whom are members and volunteers of the Order of Malta, are perceived as legitimate targets. They are attacked, ransomed, kidnapped, in occurrences that are becoming more and more frequent; numbers of them have lost their lives."..

"I refer here to the new conspiracy theories which have sprung up over recent months in various television channels and newspapers in friendly countries, but associating the sovereign Order of Malta with a private society of mercenaries which it is said are operating in Iraq and Afghanistan for a foreign government," the grandmaster explained. "These assertions have absolutely no factual basis..

"Nor is there any doubt that the authors of these assertions are themselves ill-informed. But they must know that such suggestions disseminated internationally or via the Internet put the lives of our volunteer care[givers] in grave danger as they go about their work of distributing medicines or food in these very countries, under the emblem of the order’s eight-pointed cross."