The chairman of the European Parliament’s Committee on Development, Tomas Tobé (EPP, Swedish), calls on the international community to close a rapidly growing funding gap for the world’s enormous humanitarian needs.
“I call on the international community, the EU and its Member States to provide additional funds for the provision of life-saving assistance to the most vulnerable people”, he said on Wednesday 1 March during a parliamentary committee debate on the needs in Syria and Turkey.
The record $51 billion appeal launched by the UN in December to meet the needs of 339 million people worldwide has already been derailed by the growing number of humanitarian crises, he said.
He said that the mobilisation of €185 million from the EU’s Solidarity and Emergency Aid Reserve, notably in response to needs in Africa, Yemen and Venezuela, “so early in the year, shows that the humanitarian aid budget is not sufficient to meet the growing needs around the world”. He calls on the Commission to be ready to mobilise additional funds from this reserve and other budgetary tools “to ensure that the EU response to humanitarian needs throughout the year is sufficient”. He also calls on Member States to increase their medium and long-term commitments. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)