India has pledged USD 5 million in assistance to the UN\nagency working for the welfare of Palestinian refugees to help bolster its\n“severe funding crisis” following US’ cut in its annual aid to UNRWA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A total of 20 countries, including India, announced contributions\nto the 2018 budget of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for\nPalestine Refugees in the Near East during a meeting, as officials called for\nstable financing for the agency amid devastating conflicts and violence in the\nMiddle East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In March, India announced it will increase its annual\ncontribution to the UNRWA from USD 1.5 million to USD 5 million from 2018-19\nfor a period of three years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While India pledged USD 5 million, Sweden will contribute\nUSD 250 million over four years, the UK USD 51 million and the UAE USD 50\nmillion among other donors, said a UN statement on Monday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pierre Krahenbuhl, Commissioner-General of UNRWA, said that\nin January, the agency’s financial situation became catastrophic due to the\nsudden loss of USD 300 million in voluntary contributions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Facing the most severe funding crisis in our history,\nwe had no time for pessimism or indecision,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We cannot afford to allow UNRWA’s vital efforts to\nfalter. Failure to provide desperately needed resources comes with a price:\nmore hardship for communities, more desperation for the region; more\ninstability for our world,” UN chief Antonio Guterres was quoted as saying\nin the statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
UNRWA has been providing health, education, relief and\nsocial services, as well as emergency humanitarian assistance, to some 5.3\nmillion Palestinian refugees across its five fields of operation – Jordan,\nLebanon, Syria, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip – for 65 years, it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Trump administration in January US said it would withhold\nUSD 65 million of USD 125 million it had planned to send to UNRWA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
UNRWA relies almost entirely on voluntary contributions from\nstates and the US is the largest contributor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mr Trump has questioned the value of such funding, and the\nUS State Department said UNRWA needed to make unspecified reforms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Over 120 countries defied Mr Trump in December and voted in favour of a UN General Assembly resolution calling for the US to drop its recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
About UNRWA:<\/strong> India has pledged USD 5 million in assistance to the UN agency working for the welfare of Palestinian refugees to help bolster its “severe funding crisis” following US’ cut in its annual aid to UNRWA. A total of 20 countries, including India, announced contributions to the 2018 budget of the United Nations Relief and Works […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":3217,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[58],"class_list":["post-3216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-current-affairs-articles","tag-international-current-affairs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3216"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3623,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3216\/revisions\/3623"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gkseries.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA)<\/strong> for Palestine Refugees in the Near East<\/strong> is a Relief and human development agency. It was established in 8 December 1949. <\/strong>It has been providing relief, social services health and education as well as emergency humanitarian assistance since 1950.
UNRWA is the only UN agency dedicated to helping refugees from a specific region or conflict and is separate from UNHCR Formed in 1950. UNHCR is the main UN refugee agency. It is responsible for aiding other refugees all over the world.
Area of Operation: <\/strong>
UNRWA <\/strong>includes areas of operation in the Palestinian territories, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. It provides aid in 5 fields of operation, Syria, West Bank (including East Jerusalem), Jordan, Lebanon, and Gaza Strip.
Aid for Palestinian refugees outside these 5 areas of operation is provided by UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees).<\/strong>
Relation about India and UNRWA:<\/strong>
Government of India is assisting 150 Palestinian professionals <\/strong>under Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) <\/strong>programme every year.
India has increased its annual financial contribution fourfold to UNRWA core budget from $1.25 Million in 2016 to $5 million in 2018 in solidarity with Palestine refugees.
In the past 5 years under India-Palestine Development Partnership, several agreements have been signed in fields of IT, agriculture, healthcare, women\u2019s empowerment, media, consular affairs and youth affairs.
Palestine Refugees:<\/strong>
The term Palestine refugees <\/strong>originally referred to both Arabs and Jews<\/strong> whose normal place of residence had been in Mandatory Palestine. <\/strong>Palestine Refuge are people who lost their livelihoods as a result of the 1948 Palestine war.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"