Since June 1991 the ICRC has, in accordance with its mandate, been running large-scale and diverse programmes for the victims of the conflict in the former Yugoslavia. Its activities focus on providing protection for prisoners and for civilians affected by the fighting, tracing missing persons and arranging for the exchange of news between the members of separated families, distributing food and other aid to displaced people and vulnerable groups, providing medical and surgical assistance to the warwounded; and of course spreading knowledge of international humanitarian law, especially among armed forces of all parties to the conflict.