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Joint humanitarian aid fund for Gaza in the pipeline, FM says

The possibility of a joint fund for providing humanitarian aid to Gaza was discussed by the participants in a teleconference on the development of a humanitarian maritime corridor from Cyprus, chaired on Wednesday evening by Cyprus’ Foreign Minister, Constantinos Kombos, who said that a second ship is to depart in a few days from the port of Larnaca for Gaza. Qatar is now participating in the project, while the US are expediting the construction of a floating dock in Gaza.

In his statements to journalists at the Presidential Palace, after the teleconference, Kombos said that the Foreign Ministers of the USA, the UAE, the UK, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Qatar, the EU Commissioner responsible for crisis management and the Coordinator of Humanitarian Aid and Reconstruction of Gaza of the UN, participated in it. According to the Cypriot Foreign Minister, all participants reaffirmed the commitment for the continuation of their countries’ involvement, as well as of the European Commission, and the ac
tivation of the role of the UN Coordinator in this effort. “We are at a stage of intensive processes aimed at systematising the provision of humanitarian aid through the now activated Amalthia project’, he said.

Kombos said that the group was considering setting up a joint fund with the aim of strengthening the viability of the maritime corridor, while they were in consultations with both the UN Coordinator’s team and the EU.

As a second step, he announced that a meeting would take place on March 21 in Cyprus at the level of coordinators from all states and organizations.

As a third step, the Foreign Minister stated that preparations have already begun to send a second ship with additional humanitarian aid, recalling that the first ship sailed on Tuesday from the port of Larnaca.

He said that Nicosia has repeatedly, ‘made it absolutely clear’ that the Cypriot initiative was an additional, complementary effort to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza, complementing existing and future land crossings as well as
other passages. ‘It does not work in competition, but complementary’, he said, adding that the common goal was for humanitarian aid to reach the people who need it as quickly as possible.

Asked when the second ship would depart, Kombos said possibly within the week, and it will carry the same kind of aid, ‘almost exclusively food, at this stage’.

Regarding the first ship, Kombos said that ‘everything is going well, the course of the ship is the one that was originally planned’.

Security issues such as arrival time and operational planning are also taken into account, he said. In response to another question, he said that when the pier is built by the Americans, then there will be a possibility for greater frequency of humanitarian aid transfer, noting that the construction of the pier ‘will be a very important parameter’.

He said that they were briefed during the teleconference by the US Secretary of State about how the pier will be set up, noting that, possibly, the floating structure would be ready earl
ier than originally expected.

To a question about Qatar’s participation in this effort, the Foreign Minister said that ‘it is clearly important’, stressing that ‘at this moment we need help at all levels’. He noted that this was an extremely complex undertaking with many technical elements, such as personnel, funding, management of aid arriving in Cyprus, among other things.

Source: Cyprus News Agency