That's our message to Daily Echo readers who backed our Give Them Hope campaign to get vital supplies to refugees in Serbia.

Hundreds of thousands of men, women and children fled the Kosovo province of Yugoslavia back in 1999 following the outbreak of war.

Although many returned, some 1.3m people are today still displaced, including 230,000 ethnic Serbs, Roma and other minority groups.

While the political and military situation remains fragile, the refugees are unsure if they will ever be safe to return home and are facing the prospect of rebuilding their lives in the war-ravaged towns and villages to which they fled four years ago.

Following a massive campaign to collect unwanted foreign currency, charity volunteers have raised more than enough cash to deliver a lorry load of aid to them.

Scores of green collection buckets have been placed on shop counters across the county since the campaign was launched in January this year.

The aim was to raise enough cash to pay for the petrol for a 7.5 ton lorry from Hampshire to make the 3,500 mile round trip to Serbia alongside a second lorry from the county that has already been funded.

The buckets are being collected and cashed in to pay for the transportation of vital supplies which will leave Hampshire this weekend.

The aid includes food, bedding, toys and children's books, toiletries, shoes, gardening equipment, musical instruments and cleaning materials.

"It's really excellent and the response has been overwhelming," said charity volunteer Bernard Sullivan from Hope and Aid Direct.

"We are not sure of the exact amount that has been raised yet but it is well over the £2,500 we needed to deliver the aid. We will know the final figure in about six weeks but we are confident there is more than enough."

Two lorries will be loaded with supplies this Friday night and the volunteers from Hampshire will begin the five-day journey early on Saturday morning.

Bernard added: "We are expecting to be sharing up to 18 hours driving a day and we will be sleeping in the back of the lorries.

"We hope to meet up with a further five trucks, each weighing 38 tons (which have already started the journey because they go slower) and drive alongside seven trucks the same size as ours which are coming from across England."