Third International Humanitarian Pledging Conference for Syria announced 3.8 billion US dollar aid

The global community on 31 March 2015 pledged financial support of 3.8 billion US dollars to crisis hit Syria at the third International Humanitarian Pledging Conference for Syria held in Kuwait city.

The financial aid will help the United Nations (UN) organisations and partners to meet urgent needs of victims of Syria’s civil war and neighbouring countries.

The UN-led conference was attended by representatives of 78 nations and 38 humanitarian organisations.

Major donors are: Kuwait's Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad (300 million US dollars), the European Union (1 billion US dollars), the US (507 million US dollars), the United Arab Emirates (100 million US dollars) and Saudi Arabia (60 million US dollars).

The amount pledged at the third conference is nearly equal to the 3.9 billion dollars pledged at the first and second conferences held in Kuwait in 2013 and 2014 respectively.

In 2013, 71 percent of the 1.5 billion dollars pledged were received, while in 2014, only 58 percent of 2.3 billion dollars promised were received.

The global community has set 8.4 billion US dollars as the target for 2015.

Comment

The armed conflict began in March 2011 between the forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and those opposed to his rule led by Free Syrian Army (FSA), Islamic Front (IF), Hezbollah and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

According to a UN report released in the third week of March 2015 about 2 lakh civilians were killed, 7.6 million people have been internally displaced and another 3.9 million are seeking refuge in neighbouring countries of Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq due to the ongoing civil war.

In the conference, the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon observed that due to civil war, four out of five people in Syria were living in poverty, misery and deprivation and that the country had lost nearly 40 years of human development.