A CAERPHILLY woman has helped raise more than £21,000 as part of a global donation appeal.

Harriet Wright, 27, who now lives in Qatar, has inspired 101 people from across the world to run 1,001km in 100 hours to raise money for Save the Children’s Yemen appeal.

The appeal is to help children in the war-torn country who are in desperate need for humanitarian assistance.

The corporate lawyer and Save the Children fundraiser heard about the Yemen war from a travel blogger on Instagram who shared information about the crisis. She decided to do something to raise awareness and money after the war-torn country suffered the additional blow of the coronavirus pandemic on top of the initial situation.

Mrs Wright said: “I’ve always followed the Yemen situation closely, but now how its worsened with the coronavirus impact, I thought it was about time I practiced what I preached. I had to do something to help.

“Not everyone has forgotten Yemen’s children and by coming together to fundraise, we hope we can really make an impact. There’s lots of fundraising in the UK for the NHS at the moment, when I imagined the families in Yemen who are facing a fight against coronavirus without a healthcare system, I knew I had to act.”

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In total, 101 people from 11 different countries had one hour each to run as far as they could with the hope that collectively they could reach the 1,001km goal. They began at 2pm GMT on Wednesday, July 1 and finished at 5pm on Sunday, July 5. The time slots were pulled out of a hat and some of the runners were running through the night.

Mrs Wright said: “I have been overwhelmed by the support I have received. This challenge was initially a 48-hour challenge but over 24 hours we have had enough volunteers for the event to be run over 100 hours. We have a whole host of people taking part, from Nawal Al-Maghafi, an award-winning Yemeni filmmaker and BBC Yemen correspondent to a local Welsh professional rugby league player Rhodri Lloyd and my friend Natasha Cockram who owns the Welsh marathon record.”

Others supported by promoting the event in other ways, including Welsh football international Aaron Ramsey, Welsh rugby internationals Josh Navidi and George North joining British athletes Jazmin Sawyer, George Williams and Sam Tompkins in promoting the event via social media. Steff Hughes who plays rugby for the Scarlets also took part by cycling alongside one of the runners.