EU reiterates strong support to Belarusian civil society
24.03.2011 | Publications
An informal EU-led international donors’ coordination meeting on Belarus is taking place in Brussels today, on 21 March. A Commission press release said the meeting, aimed “to stimulate discussions among donors and with representatives of the Belarusian civil society,” is being held in the wake of an earlier announcement that the European Commission would increase its direct support for Belarusian civil society fourfold for the period 2011 – 2013.
Commissioner
for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy Štefan Füle, who is
taking part in the discussions, said the meeting would provide “an important opportunity to further demonstrate our solidarity with
the population and civil society of Belarus. It will help ensure that
the international assistance provided in this difficult period, is
focussed, targeted and supportive.”
The
meeting is a follow-up to Warsaw’s “Solidarity with Belarus”
international donors’ conference in February this year, where
Commissioner Füle announced that the Commission was quadrupling its aid
to Belarus civil society and would offer urgent support to victims,
raising the total EU funding targeting Belarusian population to ? 17.3
million for 2011-2013.
The
donors' coordination meetings on Belarus makes up a donors’ platform
that has been successfully used several times a year since 2006, the
press release said, adding it has built “a valuable expertise on
donors coordination and the link with the Warsaw conference should lead
to a more efficient and effective support to meet the needs of
Belarusian civil society.”
Invitees
include all EU member states, international organisations and other
international donors, as well as Belarusian civil society
representatives.
In a separate development, European Foreign Ministers added 19 Belarus officials to the lists of persons subject to restrictive measures,
including travel ban and assets freeze. Council Conclusions said this
was done “in view of the gravity of the situation in Belarus."
-
03.01
-
07.10
-
22.09
-
17.08
-
12.08
-
30.09
