GENEVA: States must do more to resolve the world’s crises as budget cuts force aid agencies to scale back their operations, a top Red Cross official said on Thursday (Apr 10).
His comments came in the wake of drastic cuts to international aid funding by a number of countries, particularly the United States, which had long been the world’s biggest donor.
“It is completely legitimate for humanitarian action to be questioned”, Pierre Krahenbuhl, director-general of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), told Swiss daily Le Temps.
“We can be told to do better with less,” he said. But states had to be more “coherent” in their response, he argued.
“They tend to accept that (conflicts) drag on and that humanitarian action is there” to step in, said Krahenbuhl.
“Above all, we need states to seek to resolve the conflicts in question,” he added.
There was too much reliance on aid agencies, and it was deeply “regrettable to see that some see dialogue and mediation as a sign of weakness”, said Krahenbuhl.
“The nonchalance with which human beings go to war only to later say ‘never again’ is very disturbing.”
Since US President Donald Trump took office, Washington has announced the cancellation of 83 per cent of programmes at the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
A number of United Nations agencies have already begun slashing jobs globally and have warned they will need to scale back their operations and lower their ambitions.
“Everyone is very worried,” said Krahenbuhl from Geneva – home not only to the Red Cross headquarters but also the UN’s European headquarters and hundreds of international organisations and non-governmental organisations.
Nor was Washington the only country cutting back its aid budget, he added.
“Several European states are doing the same, insisting that they must prioritise national defence issues and rearming (to justify) reducing their support for humanitarian aid,” he said.
“With the increase in conflicts and a partial disengagement of some donors, humanitarian aid is facing a particularly critical situation.”
Even before the US cuts, the ICRC was grappling with a deep financial crisis. It had already undergone painful reforms, slashing its budget and workforce.
Krahenbuhl, a Swiss national, took over as ICRC chief a year ago with the mission to help reform an organisation to tackle that financial shortfall.
