EUROPE’S DILEMMA ON HUMANITARIAN AID & CRISIS FUNDS
Erle Frayne D. Argonza
The West just may be so immersed in internal crisis and power squabbles that the Europeans seemed to have forgotten the basics in budgetary essentials.
A raging issue within continental institutions is whether to merge humanitarian aid and crisis management budgets. Africa, which comprises the greatest client-states of Europe, is the most direly affected by the debates and dilemmas.
Below is a summary situationer regarding the dilemma.
[Philippines, 06 July 2011]
Source: http://www.devex.com/en/articles/planned-merger-of-eu-humanitarian-crisis-budgets-draws-flak
Planned Merger of EU Humanitarian, Crisis Budgets Draws Flak
A refugee camp in Burundi that is supported by the European Commission's humanitarian aid department. Aid groups and members of the European Parliament fear that the proposed merger of the European Union's humanitarian aid and crisis management budgets after 2013 would increasingly politicize the bloc's aid. Photo by: Yves Horent / European Commission / ECHO
Aid groups and members of the European Parliament fear that the proposed merger of the European Union’s humanitarian aid and crisis management budgets after 2013 would increasingly politicize the bloc’s aid.
“There is an idea on the table [to merge the two budgets] which is being considered by some people,” a European Commission official working in the humanitarian aid sector told Euobserver on Feb. 10 on condition of anonymity. “It’s not a formal proposal at the moment and it’s not something we would support.”
The European Commission is expected to propose a blueprint for the EU’s next multiannual budget in June, Euobserver reports.
There have been speculations that the merger of the EU’s humanitarian aid and crisis management budgets will prompt EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton to call the shots in humanitarian aid spending.
“I don’t know where the idea came from or how developed it is. It may be a wrongly interpreted idea of efficiency or part of the inter-institutional power politics currently going on,” Dutch Socialist MEP Thijs Berman told Euobserver.
“If it ends up in the June proposals I will fight it. Humanitarian aid needs to be impartial in order to ensure that all parties in a recipient country accept it as not favouring one side or the other. This is also crucial for the safety of humanitarian aid workers distributing support on the ground,” Berman said.
The EU’s humanitarian aid budget is managed by Bulgarian commissioner Kristalina Georgieva, while crisis management resources are administered by the newly launched European External Action Service, which is led by Ashton.
Read more development aid news.
2 comments:
Surely a bad timing for Europe to be aiding Africa, when Eu is itself in trouble.
Let it be, that differences in Europe can lead later to the return to the nations there. Brussels must be abolished.
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