Brussels, 19/02/2013 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission is increasing its humanitarian aid funding to Mali by €22 million to assist the victims of the conflict within the country. The decision was announced on Tuesday 19 February the day after the Foreign Affairs Council had confirmed the EU's humanitarian commitment to the people of Mali (see EUROPE 10788).
The funding, which comes from the ECHO budget (European Commission's Humanitarian Office), will allow food aid to be stepped up and improve access by the people to basic services throughout Mali. This comes at a time when the food situation in northern Mali is growing worse and where the population is suffering from great insecurity heightened by an infestation of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) along the roads.
“Our top priority in Mali is to stabilise the very fragile food security situation which has been aggravated by the impact of the violence”, says Kristalina Georgieva, European Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response. She points out that “there are a million people affected by the crisis in the North in urgent need of food assistance”.
The additional funding will bring to €42 million the total humanitarian aid allocated this year by the Commission for the victims of the conflict in Mali, and to €115 million the Commission's humanitarian effort since the crisis began in 2012. (AN/transl.jl)