Swiss Government Contribution to the ICRC Headquarters’ Appeal 2025 (Sitzbudget IKRK)

The ICRC is an independent, neutral organization ensuring humanitarian protection and assistance for victims of armed conflict and other situations of violence during emergencies and protracted conflicts. It also promotes the international humanitarian law (IHL) and its implementation in national law.

The work of the ICRC is based on the Geneva Conventions of 1949, their Additional Protocols, its Statutes – and those of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement – and the resolutions of the International Conferences of the Red Cross and Red Crescent.

The four Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocols confer the ICRC with a specific mandate to act in the event of international armed conflict. In particular, the ICRC has the right to visit prisoners of war and civilian internees.

The Conventions also give the ICRC a broad right of initiative. In non-international armed conflicts, the ICRC enjoys a right of humanitarian initiative recognized by the international community and enshrined in Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions.

Humanitarian aid is an important plank of Switzerland’s foreign policy strategy. Switzerland and the ICRC defend the same principles: the aim to protect all victims of armed conflict without distinction and to ensure respect for international humanitarian law.

As depositary state of the Geneva Conventions, Switzerland has a long history of close relations with the ICRC. The legal status of the ICRC in Switzerland as a Swiss private law association that carries out an international mandate, is laid down in a 1993 Headquarters Agreement amended in November 2020 in order to respond more effectively to global challenges and increasing digitalization. The importance of the ICRC and the Swiss contribution to the ICRC headquarters of CHF 80.0 million is laid out in Switzerland’s current International Cooperation Strategy 2025-2028.

The organization is the most important partner of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) in the humanitarian field.
The core contribution reflects Switzerland’s interest for the ICRC to have strong and well-established headquarters in Geneva. For the ICRC, Geneva acts as a hub for fostering relations with the UN agencies, the Permanent Missions and the Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). The promotion and systematic support of International Geneva is part of Switzerland's foreign policy strategy.

The cooperation between Switzerland and the ICRC is based on a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the FDFA and the ICRC. The MoU was revised in 2024 and will be signed in the first half of 2025.

The ICRC continuously strengthens its capacity to protect and assist through law, policy and operation. ICRC’s field implementation rate was at 87% in 2024 and 94% in 2023 with a presence in over 100 countries.

The proliferation of conflict situations around the world and their protracted nature continued in 2024, leading to a further increase in humanitarian needs. Despite these challenges, the ICRC remained decisive in many conflict situations:

In 2023, the ICRC managed to reach a large number of conflict-affected people amongst others: 22’624 detainees were visited and monitored individually in over 885 places of detention. 301 of them received medical assistance and donated medicines. 1,87 million telephone and video calls were facilitated between family members separated as a result of armed conflict. 36 million people had access to treated water for drinking or irrigation. 734 hospitals in conflict zones received ICRC support. More than 211’000 surgical operations on people wounded by weapons and other traumas were recorded.

The ICRC continued to engage with governments and intergovernmental bodies on ways to improve IHL acceptance and national compliance. 

The ICRC and the IFRC have successfully organized the 34th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent. They have kept working on initiatives to develop and strengthen National Societies (NS) such as the National Society Investment Alliance (NSIA) to invest in capacity-building and organizational development of NS.

Despite the challenges faced, the ICRC was able to cope with the unprecedented financial crisis in 2023 that led it to make significant cuts and efforts to mobilize additional resources. The ICRC also adopted a new strategy aimed at refocusing its activities on its core mandate and improving the institution's financial monitoring. In 2023 and 2024, the ICRC has reached the financial equilibrium and has partially rebuilt its reserves/liquidity.

The ICRC's 2025 budget amounts to CHF 2.17 billion. Thanks to significant cuts undertaken in 2023 in its operations and an effort to mobilize resources, the ICRC avoided a major financial crisis. In 2024, SDC’s contribution amounted to CHF 155.18 million broken down into CHF 80.0 million for its headquarters in Geneva and CHF 75.18 million for its field operations (see annex 5). Switzerland was the ICRC's fourth largest donor in 2024 with CHF 157.3 million (see annex 4).

The ICRC strives to continuously improve the effectiveness and efficiency of its work and to increase its accountability, first to its beneficiaries, and second to external stakeholders, particularly donors.

Given the challenging dynamics of today’s conflicts and the uncertainty of the contribution from some donors (USA, Germany), the ICRC keeps implementing its Institutional Strategy 2024-2027 refocused on its core mandate in geographical contexts and thematic files where it has the strongest added value such as:

1. Upholding the centrality of protection and promoting IHL

2. Enhancing the response impact in acute and protracted phases of conflicts

3. Optimizing risk management and financial stability

Talks around IHL are maintained in the framework of the IHL Global Initiative, and the follow-up of the Swiss presidency of the UNSC and the 34th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent.

ICRC delegations coordinate with IFRC and the respective NS to help build local response capacity. The adoption of The Movement Coordination for Collective Impact Agreement (Seville Agreement 2.0) has brought a clearer vision of a long-term plan on capacity-building of NS. NSIA funding remains a challenge. Switzerland decided to reinforce the NSIA team with a Swiss expert (SKH) to better profile the results obtained in the framework of the projects.

Following the financial crisis, high-level discussions were still taking place to assess the ICRC's financial situation.

SDC has made major efforts to improve the "quality and predictability" of its financial contributions without tying it to specific contexts or programmes, which gives the ICRC considerable leeway to finance its operations in forgotten conflicts. In 2024, for the first time, a regional contribution was allocated to ICRC Africa region (CHF 24.1 million) and another regional contribution will be made for the Middle East in 2025 (CHF 19.6 million).

Beyond this, the strategic exchanges have been deepened in the framework of the Senior Management Meeting (SMM) and other interactions at both field and HQ level: Ukraine, Gaza, 34th International Conference, digitalization and the Swiss membership in the UN security council.

Switzerland, in close collaboration with other donors and the ICRC, must continue to work on the long-term financial resilience of the ICRC, and in particular considering the potential decrease of funding from the USA, Germany and other donors.

2024: 4 2021: 3 2018: 5

2023: 3 2020: 4 2017: 5

2022: 3 2019: 4 2016: 4

With regard to ICRC headquarters donors, Switzerland’s contribution of CHF 80.0 million is on rank 2 (rank 1 among Government donors).

In 2024, the main other donors of ICRC headquarters were a Geneva-based foundation and the USA.

For headquarters and field, the main other donors are: US CHF 495.6 million, UK CHF 207.9 million, Germany CHF 175.7 million, and the EC CHF 142.7 million.

Coordination and the use of synergies take place through the regular meetings of the ICRC Donor Support Group (DSG), bilateral formal and informal exchanges as well as the exchange at the occasion of field visits.