Emergency.lu is a mobile satellite communications platform, deployed to crisis regions to help support relief efforts, for example in the Bahamas, Chad, the Comoros, Dominican Republic, Guinea, Haiti, Madagascar, Mali and a dozen other countries.

40 volunteers from the country’s emergency services are trained to set up and operate the satellite system. Three were deployed over the weekend to the south of Sudan where thousands of refugees have arrived in recent weeks fleeing conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region.

Access to reliable communications networks is a “crucial element for humanitarian work, both after natural disasters and in chronic crises,” said Franz Fayot (LSAP), minister for development cooperation and humanitarian assistance, at the signing of the new contract.

The programme was developed following the 2010 Haiti earthquake and the public-private partnership was formally established in 2014.

Updated on 1.35pm to correct a mistranslation of "sud du Soudan" from South Sudan to the south of Sudan