Photography exhibition of the Order of Malta’s humanitarian activities in the Mediterranean area

Rome, 2 September – The Sovereign Order of Malta is participating in the 11th edition of the Mediterranean Festival of Journalists in Otranto, the event that gathers diplomats, journalists, bloggers, academics and writers from this region. For the occasion, the Order of Malta has organised a photography exhibition with 28 panels offering some 40 photographs of the humanitarian activities in the Mediterranean basin of this ancient institution which, from its origin in the Holy Land in the 11th century, spread throughout this area developing a network of solidarity and assistance still active today.

From the hospital ships used during the first world war to the rescue at sea on Italian vessels during the recent dramatic shipwrecks in the Mediterranean, the Order of Malta has always been in the forefront in assisting those in distress. The photography exhibition thus offers an overview of the main health and social care activities performed by the Order of Malta’s 80 thousand volunteers and 42 thousand professionals, now present in 120 countries worldwide.

The exhibition will be inaugurated in Largo Porta Alfonsina in the afternoon of Wednesday 4 September with a seminar illustrating the Order’s sovereignty, its diplomatic network and its main humanitarian aid projects, including hospitals, clinics, social welfare centres, schools, summer camps for the disabled, inclusion projects for the excluded and soup kitchens.

There will be a press conference in the headquarters of the Puglia Region in Bari to present the Order’s participation in the Mediterranean Festival of Journalists – in cooperation with the municipality of Otranto – the morning of Wednesday 4 September. The mayor of Otranto, Pierpaolo Cariddi, and the Sovereign Order of Malta’s ambassador to the United Nations in Rome, Gabriele Checchia, will give speeches.