People working to relieve human suffering in conflict zones can face difficult choices. Notwithstanding their moral principles, in practice they will have to seek the co-operation of aggressors or human-rights abusers to reach those most in need.

Humanitarian agencies know this all too well and although occasionally they are accused of getting too close to one side or another, compromise is inevitable and justified, says Hugo Slim, author of Humanitarian Ethics: A Guide to the Morality of Aid in War and Disaster. Not just that but public silence – something typically associated with moral cowardice – is sometimes the best, or most ethical, response to wrongdoing, says Slim, who is head of policy at the International Committee of the Red Cross.

By way of example, he cites the look Jesus gave to Peter when he betrayed him for the third time, a biblical event described by religious author Diarmaid MacCulloch as “one of the most eloquent quiet stares in human history”. Saying nothing can be “pregnant with meaning”, argues Slim. Thus, he provides today’s idea: “A person’s silence or an organisation’s silence often sends a powerful challenge to interpret their silence.”

Given the fluid nature of their work, should humanitarian agencies go into a conflict situation with a fixed moral framework?

“I think they can go in with a very fixed form of moral aspiration, knowing what they would like to do: they want to be primarily humanitarian and respond to people’s urgent needs, and do so in a neutral and impartial way.

“But the point I’d make, and this is true of politics generally, is that the world doesn’t work like that. For a humanitarian agency to say, ‘We’re going to come into your war and give out food to people who we decide and in places we choose’, it’s very hard to do that.

“You have to negotiate because a lot of people have very different interests in an armed conflict. So you have to struggle to realise these moral ambitions in a war situation.”

Is there an inevitability of being compromised, to use a loaded term?

“Yes, but it’s a great word ‘compromise’, because it’s not necessarily a moral failure. It’s often a great moral virtue. In a sense, it means both parties promise to do good things, or at least not to do bad things.

“I think it’s important to distinguish between good compromise, where you are getting enough of what you need and they are assured they are getting enough of what they need, and a rotten compromise, where one side is being exploited in some way.

“There is no doubt a lot of humanitarian agencies have to operate quite close to the line of a rotten compromise, and that’s very difficult and quite morally stressful, constantly wondering if you have gone too far and if you’re being used and simply not reaching enough people and not being true to your agency’s goals.”

What exactly is humanitarian silence?

“I think it’s a very important principle, the idea that humanitarian silence can be a moral position. The modern human-rights movement has emerged out of enlightenment commitments to social justice, anti-slavery movements and a whole tradition of very public advocacy: the old Quaker adage of ‘Speak truth to power’. So the modern tradition of human rights is quite noisy.

“A humanitarian organisation has to be different because we are asking to be very close on the ground where these violations are actually happening so that we can try and help people affected and change the behaviour of the people who are violating international humanitarian law.

“There is a legitimate form of silent operations sometimes, and that is public silence, where we won’t speak out. That’s legitimate particularly if other people are speaking out and there’s a big public outcry against violations.

“I would take the example of our work with prisoners of war, where we are seeing hundreds of thousands of people detained. It is very important for us to be able to speak very directly to the authorities in those situations – and we are very direct with authorities – but we do it in a confidential dialogue and we try to bring about change that way. And very often we are able to improve prison conditions and improve the due process of law.

“Only very occasionally where we feel we are not making any progress at all and where the state or nonstate actor is not making any progress, then we will speak out publicly.”

Can government agencies use humanitarian silence too?

“I think sometimes it’s true and sometimes it is probably states trying to keep things in the shadows. But there’s no doubt that you can have a delicate diplomatic process which works better for a period by not being in the spotlight. We know that from many armed conflicts and peace processes, and we do that in our own lives. We don’t want everything talked about in public as we try to work it out. That’s why we do confession and therapy. We don’t necessarily want our therapy live-streamed on Twitter.”

• Humanitarian Ethics by Hugo Slim is published by Hurst

ASK A SAGE

• Question: What's the best form of giving?
• Maimonides replies (from his Eight Degrees of Charity): "The greatest level above which there is no other, is to strengthen another by giving him a present or loan, or making a partnership with him, or finding him a job in order to strengthen his hand until he needs no longer beg from people."