AG Global Responsibility welcomes funds for humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip and calls on the government to step up its commitment to a ceasefire
It is gratifying that the Council of Ministers decided today to allocate 10 million euros from the Foreign Disaster Fund for people in need in the Gaza Strip. But without a ceasefire, these means cannot currently have the effect they are intended to have. Stopping all fighting is a prerequisite so that humanitarian organizations can reach those people who now need humanitarian assistance
Lukas Wank, Managing Director of the AG Global Responsibility
Vienna (OTS) – “It is gratifying that the Council of Ministers decided today to allocate 10 million euros from the Foreign Disaster Fund for people in need in the Gaza Strip. However, without a ceasefire, these funds cannot currently have the effect for which they are intended. The halt to all fighting is A prerequisite for humanitarian organizations to be able to reach those people who now need humanitarian assistance.”
says Lukas Wank, managing director of AG Global Responsibility, concerned.
The vast majority of the population of the Gaza Strip – a region the size of Bratislava – fled the fighting to the south, reports Wank. The city of Rafah now has six times as many inhabitants as before the war. Over two million people, half of them children, suffer from hunger every day, live in inhumane conditions and can hardly protect themselves from disease.
“The ongoing fighting without secure access to the suffering population is ultimately a violation of the humanitarian imperative, which states that all people who need it should be able to receive humanitarian aid. We therefore appeal to the Austrian federal government to resolutely support a ceasefire. Only then can this be done “ICRC, UNICEF and WHO – which are supposed to receive the 10 million euros from Austria – actually provide people with medical care and provide them with food, drinking water and other urgently needed relief supplies,” Wank pleads for increased use of Austrian diplomacy.
Die GLOBAL RESPONSIBILITY – Working Group for Development and Humanitarian Aid is the umbrella organization of 36 Austrian development and humanitarian non-governmental organizations. Our member organizations carry out 1,000 projects in 120 countries every year, helping to enable a decent life for everyone on a healthy planet.
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