Brussels, 15/12/2014 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission and Italy signed the constitutive agreement on Monday 15 December launching the first ever EU Regional Trust Fund, “a new strategic financing tool to mobilise more aid in response to the Syrian crisis”, the Commission has announced. The start-up funding provided amounts to €20 million from the EU budget and €3 million from Italy as the first founding donor. Additional funding is expected in 2015.
The fund will initially focus on support for refugees and host communities in neighbouring countries and could become a funding vehicle for future post-conflict reconstruction effort, the Commission says. It will allow the EU and its member states to pool resources in one single and flexible mechanism to better respond to the growing needs of these refugees and of the countries hosting them. The trust fund is open to other donors, public or private, and will help provide the “more coherent and enhanced response” needed, stresses Neighbourhood Policy Commissioner Johannes Hahn.
Foreign affairs ministers meeting in Council on the same day welcomed the establishment of the fund. In their conclusions, the EU and its member states call on the international community to “step up its funding and assistance in view of the winter and in response to the forthcoming 2015 appeals”, after the World Food Programme (WFP) had been forced temporarily to suspend aid to Syrian refugees because of a lack of funding.
Support for UN special envoy
Ministers also pledged their full support to UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura's efforts to “achieve a strategic de-escalation of violence as a basis for a broader sustainable political process”. “It is urgent to work on a freeze, particularly in Aleppo, not only because of the size of its population but also because it is important symbolically in the region and the country”, said High Representative Federica Mogherini (our translation).
“The EU stands ready to support concretely the development of his proposals, in particular the proposal to build on local freezes of hostility in compliance with international humanitarian law in Aleppo and elsewhere”, states the Council. Ministers added that the EU will seek ways to provide practical support to the efforts of de Mistura, “notably by contributing to the revival of local governance and administration, to the restoration of basic services and to the return to normalcy in areas of reduced violence, in particular in Aleppo, as conditions allow”. Luxembourg Minister Jean Asselborn said that, if the fighting ceased in Aleppo, “everything possible would have to be done to provide the people with food and medicines, and that could be an important role for the EU” (our translation).
Reduction of violence will not be achieved without effective monitoring, preferably anchored in the United Nations Security Council, ministers warned. They also underlined that the EU is ready to engage with “all regional and international actors” with influence over the Syrian parties and calls on them to use their influence constructively towards this end. The high representative says that “all actors” means, inter alia, the major Gulf states like Saudi Arabia and also Iran and Russia.
Condemnation of violence by IS and Assad
Ministers “unreservedly” condemned the atrocities and human rights violations and abuses perpetrated by the Assad regime as well as Islamic State (IS)/Da'esh, Jabhat al-Nusra and other terrorist groups, denouncing the indiscriminate bombings of the Syrian regime and the atrocities committed by IS. They say that intensified military action by the Assad regime against areas held by the opposition threaten the de Mistura initiative.
During discussions, a European diplomatic source has revealed, some ministers, including those of Poland and Estonia, argued that there had to be communication with Bashar al Assad in order to combat IS, something other ministers, like the UK's, refused to contemplate. In its conclusions of 20 October, the Council stated that the Assad regime, because of its actions and the consequences of those actions, could not become a partner in the fight against IS (see EUROPE 11180). Mogherini said that Assad was not a “partner” but “part of the reality”. “We must confront that reality, we must find the ways and means to make sure the reality changes”, she added (our translation).
Ministers repeated that EU will continue its policy of imposing and enforcing sanctions targeting the regime and its supporters as long as repression continues. (CG)