WW I poster USA World War I, American propaganda poster showing a Red Cross nurse with an American flag and the Red Cross symbol. Original title: The spirit of America - Join. Howard Chandler Christy (1873 - 1952) Lithograph poster, color ; 76 x 51 cm. Forbes. Boston 1919.

An International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) van drives on May 8, 2012 on the road to Rutshsuru, some 30 kms (20 miles) from the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo city of Goma, as residents of the town of Kibumba were heading to the Nord-Kivu capital, fleeing fighting between Congolese army deserters led by ex-general Bosco Ntaganda and the regular Congolese army (FARDC) near the Virunga national park on the border with Rwanda. Hundreds of members of the rebel group the National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP) mutinied last month, complaining of inhumane treatment in the regular army. Fierce clashes have broken out between deserters and loyalists, forcing hundreds of people to flee their homes. Ntaganda, nicknamed the "Terminator", is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes including recruiting child soldiers when he was part of a militia in the early part of the last decade. AFP PHOTO / JUNIOR D.KANNAH

The coffin of French photographer Remi Ochlik is seen through the window of the International Red Crescent ambulance in Damascus on March 3, 2012. Ochlik was killed alongside American journalist Marie Colvin of the Sunday Times during a bombing attack by militants in the Baba Amr neighbourhood in the flashpoint city of Homs. AFP PHOTO?ANWAR AMRO

First aid training courses given by the French Red Cross.

A pedestrian moves past the logos of the Korea Red Cross at its headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2011. South Korea agreed Wednesday to hold talks with North Korea on reuniting families separated by war, as military officers from both sides met at the border for a second straight day to try to end tensions on the peninsula. After weeks of threatening war, North Korea has recently pushed for a set of talks including one between Red Cross agencies from the two Koreas to discuss the restarting of reunions of families separated by the 1950-53 Korean War. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

PHOTO: BARTOSZ KRUPA/EAST NEWS WARSZAWA 28/05/2010 ZBIORKA DAROW DLA POWODZIAN W PUNKCIE PCK.

PHOTO: BARTOSZ KRUPA/EAST NEWS WARSZAWA 28/05/2010 ZBIORKA DAROW DLA POWODZIAN W PUNKCIE PCK.

Switzerland, Geneva, international comity of the red cross

CROPPED VERSION This handout picture released by the UNHCR shows UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador US actress Angelina Jolie (C) chating with Red Crescent volunteers taking care of refugee children while their parents wait to register as refugees at a UNHCR registration center 27 August 2007 in Damascus, Syria. Jolie is on a two-day visit to Iraq and Syria to see first-hand the plight of four million people uprooted by the ongoing conflict in Iraq. AFP PHOTO/COURTESY UNHCR /MORRIS BERNARD == GETTY OUT ==

On the night of July 23, 2006, an Israeli aircraft fired missiles at and struck two Lebanese Red Cross ambulances performing rescue operations, causing huge explosions that injured everyone inside the vehicles.

PHOTO: EAST NEWS/LASKI DIFFUSION Objazdowy ambulans PCK w Brodach kieleckich, 1950.

PHOTO: EAST NEWS/LASKI Umieszczanie znaku PCK na podroznych apteczkach, w przychodniach i firmach farmaceutycznych jest niezgodne z prawem i grozi za to kara 2,5 tys. zl. Znak ten podlega ochronie na mocy ustawy o Polskim Czerwonym Krzyzu i Konwencji Genewskiej. "W Polsce przez 50 lat utrwalilo sie przekonanie, ze czerwony krzyz na bialym tle jest symbolem sluzby zdrowia; staramy sie to zmienic?" - powiedzial Krzysztof Kedzierski z osrodka upowszechniania miedzynarodowego prawa humanitarnego przy zarzadzie glownym PCK. Znak PCK mozna umiescic jedynie na punkcie opatrunkowym, ktory pomocy udziela bezplatnie. Na aptekach czy apteczkach podrocznych powinien znajdowac sie bialy krzyz na zielonym tle. Za wykroczenia dotyczace umieszczania znaku PCK powinna karac policja. PCK wysyla jedynie upomnienia do tych, ktorzy wykorzystuja znak w reklamach i na plakatach. W ostatnich miesiccach czerwony krzyz pojawil sie m.in. na szyldach niektorych aptek, w kampanii reklamowej towarzystwa ubezpieczeniowego i w reklamie srodkow przeciwbolowych. Znak czerwonego krzyza powstal w 1863 roku w Genewie z odwrocenia barw flagi szwajcarskiej. "Tworcy Czerwonego Krzyza chcieli w ten sposob wyrazic hold dla swojego kraju. W tym czasie symbol nie mial konotacji religijnych" - przypomnial Kedzierski. Skojarzen religijnych nabral w roku 1876, kiedy Turcja podczas wojny z Rosja zaczal stosowac Czerwony Polksiezyc. Obecnie na 181 stowarzyszen Czerwonego Krzyza na swiecie 150 uzywa znaku krzyza. W 31 krajach (muzulmanskich) funkcjonuje symbol czerwonego poksiezyca. Iran do 1980 roku uzywal znaku czerwonego lwa i slonca (symbolu dynastii Pahlawich). W 1864 roku 13 panstw podpisalo konwencje o ochronie rannych i chorych zolnierzy. Stopniowo dolaczyly do nich nastepne. Zgodnie z konwencja szpitale, ambulatoria i lekarze chronieni znakiem czerwonego krzyza nie biora udzialu w wojnie.

PHOTO: EAST NEWS/AFP Henri Dunant (1828-1910), a Swiss philosopher, in a picture dated 1893 probably in Geneva. He was the origin of the vote in 1864 of the Geneva War Convention and the founder of the International Red Cross. Dunant was awarded in 1901 the Nobel Peace Prize. N/B B/W

Brazil's soccer star who also plays for Spain's Real Madrid Ronaldo participates in a campaign by the Brazilian Red Cross in Rio de Janeiro, Monday, Dec. 26, 2005. Ronaldo was named volunteer

Red Cross volunteer Larry Walsh, right, comforts John Pubrica, left, after giving him some food near his destroyed home in Buras, La., Friday Nov. 18, 2005. (AP Photo/Chuck Burton)

Red Cross volunteers coordinate efforts at the Stratford Volunteer Fire Department building, Sunday Nov. 13, 2005, in Stratford, Iowa, the day after a tornado hit the area. At least 10 Iowa towns were hit by tornadoes Saturday. Woodward and Stratford, where as many as 32 homes were destroyed and an elderly woman killed, were the hardest hit. (AP Photo/Steve Pope)

Kashmiri earthquake survivors left homeless by Oct. 8 earthquake, wait for the treatment of their relatives in the Turkish Red Crescent's field hospital in the devastated city of Muzaffarabad, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 23, 2005. (AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici)

A Kuwaiti man walks into the Kuwait Red Crescent Head Quarters in Shuwaikh, Kuwait City on Monday, Oct. 10, 2005. Kuwait's government has announced on Monday a donation of 100 million US dollars to Pakistan and other nearby countries struck by a devastating earthquake according to a statement issued after a weekly cabinet meeting. The cabinet assigned Kuwaits Red Crescent Society to coordinate with other international aid organizations in order to send the relief assistance to Pakistan, with half of the sum will be sent immediately in the form of relief materials.(AP Photo/Gustavo Ferrari)

An illustration provided by the International Committee of the Red Cross ICRC on Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2005 showing from left to right the Red Cross, the Red Crescent and a red quadrangle, the so called Red Crystal, the latest proposal for an additional distinctive emblem for the International Commitee of the Red Cross, which was presented in the year 2000 for the first time. Delegations of the States party to the Geneva Conventions, conferred Monday, Sept. 12, 2005 about the proposal of a new additional distinctive emblem for the ICRC organisations. The final choice of the name and graphic design of the new emblem is still subject to further consideration. (AP Photo/Keystone, ICRC) ** NO SALES * NO ARCHIVES ***

Members of the Protection division of the International Committee of the Red Cross, ICRC, work on the www.familylinks.icrc.org/katrina web site, at the ICRC headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, Wednesday, Sept 7, 2005. On Sept 6, some 94,000 names have been registered on a website set up by ICRC to help people trace one another in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the number is growing. Relatives looking for missing loved ones, and evacuees in the US who want to inform their loved ones of their location, can register with the