Today is the first ever World Humanitarian Day to honour international aid workers. The UN who announced World Humanitarian Day hope the event will focus attention on aid workers and increase support for their role.

Aid staff are working in increasingly dangerous environments and are frequently targets of attacks, it says.

Last year 122 international aid workers were killed, a death toll that was higher than that for UN peacekeeping troops.

The inaugural World Humanitarian Day falls on the sixth anniversary of the bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad, in which 22 workers died.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will attend a wreath-laying ceremony at the UN in in New York to remember the victims of the 2003 attack.

The day comes six years after the bombing of the UN’s Baghdad office

Over the past few years Aid workers have been increasingly seen as legitimate targets for killing or kidnapping as a tactic for some groups.

The UN hopes the day will serve as a reminder that aid work is based on a very simple principle: to bring impartial humanitarian relief to all those in need, our correspondent says.

I know very well the risks taken by aid workers. I have a cousin who has worked as an aid worker for the UN, and has been shot, assualted and held at gun point in her time. That’s on top of having to endure hostile conditions, with basic or little amenities – she has also suffered from food poisoning and infections as a result. But she loves the work and the relief aid brings is immensely satisfying.

In our violent world of strife, civil unrest, increased climate extremes and disruption aid work has never been more important and is literally a matter of life and death for millions and a crucial support for struggling nations.