SHAFAQNA- The Group of 20 (G20) has agreed to work together to avoid a humanitarian disaster in Afghanistan, even if it means having to coordinate efforts with the Taliban, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said after hosting an emergency summit.
“There has basically been a convergence of views on the need to address the humanitarian emergency,” Draghi told reporters at the end of the special video conference.
“This was the first multilateral response to the Afghan crisis … multilateralism is coming back, with difficulty, but it is coming back,” Draghi said.
“To stand by and watch 40 million people plunge into chaos because electricity can’t be supplied and no financial system exists, that cannot and should not be the goal of the international community,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel told reporters.
Draghi said that the Taliban were crucial to getting the aid through, saying: “It’s very hard to see how one can help the Afghan people … without some sort of involvement of the Taliban government, AlJazeera reported.
“If they don’t want us to enter, we don’t enter.”
EU pledges €1 billion aid to Afghanistan
The European Union has pledged a one-billion-euro ($1.15bn) aid package for Afghanistan, according to the bloc’s chief Ursula von der Leyen.
The new package builds upon €300 million which had been already agreed to support the country’s civilian population, protect human rights and advance the coronavirus vaccination campaign. The European Commission will now add an extra €250 million for similar purposes.
These €550 million in aid will be channelled through international organisations working inside Afghanistan. The remaining €450 million have not yet been earmarked for concrete objectives, according to euronews .
Von der Leyen’s statement stressed that the EU funds are “direct support” for Afghans and would be channelled to international organisations working on the ground, not to the Taliban’s interim government, which Brussels does not recognise.