A load of humanitarian aid was dispatched from the UNHRD logistics base in Brindisi today bound for Erbil, containing blankets, tents, electrical generators and medical supplies valued at €260,000. The gesture signals the concern now being directed to the needs of the Syrian Kurds who began to take refuge in Iraq as of August. In line with what Deputy Minister Lapo Pistelli learned on a fact-finding mission to the region in October, this dispatch, which should arrive in approximately 10 days, is aimed at alleviating the population’s additional distress with the onset of winter.
Continuity and collaboration
This initiative is in direct continuity with a previous €500,000 emergency intervention by the Italian Cooperation in September, in collaboration with Unicef, to supply water to the refugees. The goods will be distributed by the Italian NGO “Un ponte per…”, in collaboration with the UNHCR. Dispatch followed two days on from Deputy Minister Pistelli’s meeting at the foreign ministry in Rome with the head of the department of foreign affairs of the regional government of Kurdistan, Falah Mustafa, who thanked Italy for the aid supplied to the largely Kurdish refugees in Iraqi Kurdistan.
UNHCR estimates over 3 million persons affected by the Syrian crisis
The United Nations has supplied humanitarian aid to over 3 million persons, a number that includes not only the displaced but, more in general, all those rendered vulnerable and in need by the Syrian crisis. A crisis that has lasted 1000 days now, to whose victims Italy has responded with rapid and substantial assistance.
Italy earmarks €20.7 million for Syrian crisis victims
To date, Italy has earmarked €20.7 million in aid, with interventions on behalf of the displaced in Syria and of the governments of Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey (and with this latest dispatch, also Iraq). More specifically, the MFA’s Directorate for Development Cooperation has lent its support to Syrians affected by the crisis through humanitarian interventions valued at €6.4 million in sectors ranging from nutritional assistance to the coordination of humanitarian protection and psycho-social assistance. The Italian government has also directed it support to the neighbouring countries where Syrian refugees are fleeing, launching interventions to date valued at €13.23 million in support for Jordan, Turkey and Lebanon concentrated in food and technical assistance, healthcare and hygiene, first aid, education and psycho-social assistance
