Brussels, 08/01/2003 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has decided to grant 9.5 million euro in humanitarian aid to North Korea. These funds, channelled through Echo (the Community's Humanitarian Office), will finance the acquisition of 39,000 tonnes of cereals and their distribution to the most vulnerable categories of the population, especially children, pregnant women and mothers of new-born babies. The Echo aid will help compensate for the reduction of the bulk aid programmes decided by Japan and the United States.
Commenting on the decision, Poul Nielson, Commissioner for humanitarian aid, declared in a press release: "a significant proportion of North Korea's population of 23 million faces food shortages and the situation is likely to worsen during the winter. Children are particularly at risk with many already seriously malnourished. The aim of the funding is quite simply to save the lives of people in desperate straits, in keeping with basic humanitarian principles"
Over the past six years, Echo has supplied over 50 million euro in humanitarian aid to North Korea, over 19.5 million of which in 2002.