Brussels, 16/07/2015 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 16 July, the European Commission announced that the EU is to mobilise an additional €64 million in emergency humanitarian aid to help vulnerable people who are victims of the crisis in Syria.
The funding will enable vital aid to be financed - health care, food, water, basic sanitation facilities and protection for the people who have been displaced in Syria and for the refugees in neighbouring countries. “The humanitarian situation is going from bad to worse as fighting has intensified in the absence of a political solution (…) I call upon all donors to stand by their commitments made in support of the people of Syria”, said European Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management Christos Stylianides in a press release. Given the scale of the crisis it is actually far more than is needed, Stylianides states.
Food aid takes up the biggest share of the EU's aid, but medical aid is also increasing in order to address the needs of over a million people urgently requiring medicines and health care.
The new funding is part of the €200 million pledged by the European Commission at the third international donors' conference for Syria held in Kuwait on 31 March. In total, it is close to €1.1 billion that the EU (the European Commission and member states) has pledged to pay in 2015 in order to finance humanitarian aid, swift recovery, and aid for Syria's stabilisation in the longer term (see EUROPE 11286). (Aminata Niang)