US pledges 7.5 million dollars aid for Cote d'Ivoire

US pledges 7.5 million dollars aid for Cote d'Ivoire

The US has announced an additional pledge of 7.5 million dollars in humanitarian assistance for refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Cote d’Ivoire and Liberia.

The State Department, which said this in a statement on Thursday, noted that with this latest funding, the US had provided over 51 million dollars in humanitarian assistance to refugees, IDPs, and other conflict-affected populations in the region.

Humanitarian support

Cote d’Ivoire political crisis turned violent after the run-off presidential election between victor Alassane Ouattara and incumbent Laurent Gbagbo in late November 2010.
The violence left hundreds of thousands of Ivorians homeless.

More than 210,000 refugees fled from Cote d’Ivoire, most to Liberia; up to a million were displaced inside Côte d’Ivoire; and thousands of nationals of neighbouring countries fled.

The statement said: “The situation in Cote d’Ivoire is improving; but some continuing unrest is still generating new refugees, and fear among those who fled stops a majority of the refugees from returning home.

“Up to an estimated 500,000 remain internally displaced,'' the department added in the statement.”

The State Department said that latest US contribution includes 6.5 million dollars in support for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and one million dollars for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

It said the assistance would help provide basic life support such as food, health care, and essential household items; the construction and maintenance of camps where needed; increasing access to clean water; and would support efforts to restore family links severed as a result of displacement.

The US, through the Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, has provided more than 28 million dollars for humanitarian support in Liberia, Côte d’Ivoire, and other neighbouring countries since March 2011.

The US Agency for International Development has also provided almost 23 million dollars in funding and food aid to non-governmental organisations and UN agencies in Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia.

PANA/Williams