United Arab Emirates serves humanitarian aid to Burkina Faso
Sheikh Mohamed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, vice president and prime minister of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and ruler of Dubai, has overseen urgent humanitarian aid to assist hundreds of thousands of refugees and displaced persons in Burkina Faso and to support the efforts of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the region. This initiative is a major boost to those affected, especially in the face of the challenges caused by the spread of COVID-19 disease, which has left hundreds of thousands dead and millions of cases diagnosed worldwide.
The Emirates' assistance to the African country has been set up just in time for the celebration of International Refugee Day, which is commemorated every year on 20 June.
Following Mohamed bin Rashid al-Maktoum's guidelines, a cargo plane carrying approximately 100 tons of aid from the International Humanitarian Services City in Dubai, including 88 tons of basic aid materials and 12 tons of aid-related equipment, left Dubai International Airport for Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. All of this in collaboration with the High Commissioner and the World Health Organization (WHO), which is leading efforts to combat the coronavirus pandemic in cooperation with all humanitarian organizations.
This action demonstrates the good direction of the foreign policy and assistance led by the Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and highlights the fact that the Emirate is at the forefront of countries that support all friendly peoples on an international level in various crisis situations, such as the current one suffered by the planet through the COVID-19. The Gulf country thus shows that it will always be an initiative to help all those in need in cases of adversity. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, an entity geared towards saving lives and protecting the rights of refugees, had already warned of the state of emergency in the central coastal region of Burkina Faso in view of the challenge of protecting and assisting more than 600,000 internally displaced persons, a figure that was expected to rise in the coming weeks.
UNHCR's global warehouses, based in the International Humanitarian Services City in Dubai, offer a strategic option for providing assistance to those most in need by air during emergencies around the world in general and in Africa in particular, where it serves livelihood items and commodities. The UN humanitarian organization is now focusing on the Sahel region near Burkina Faso, seeking to provide strong support for displaced people in the area.
This aid from the Arab country is part of a broad international assistance campaign recently launched to combat the coronavirus. This initiative has already reached more than 65 countries worldwide, with more than 900 tons of medical supplies and materials providing significant assistance to more than 905,000 health professionals fighting on the frontlines of the battle against COVID-19. Among the nations that have received aid from the Emirates are some such as Iran, Russia, China, and, lately, Jordan, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Chile, Cuba, Ghana or the United Kingdom.
