Why I Lend: to help secure a happier future

Lendwithcare lender, Daniel Openshaw, tells us why he lends ...

Srebrenica Memorial

© CARE/Jon Spaull

I started to lend with care on the day that Ratko Mladic was put on trial in The Hague for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity during the Bosnian war, 1992-95. Mladic's alleged atrocities rank amongst the worst in living memory; certainly they typify for most people the pointless horrors and bloodshed of war. He became known as the 'Butcher of Bosnia' by the media who love a nickname no matter how much it tends to trivialise the nature of heinous acts, but there was nothing trivial about Mladic's repeated slaughtering and raping under the guise of Serb nationalism. His most infamous attack was on Srebrenica, a Bosniak town under supposed UN protection in 1995 where he rounded up Bosniak boys and men and over five days his forces shot dead more than 7,500 before burying them in mass graves.