GENEVA, JUNE 26 – Today’s humanitarian emergencies need a coordinated, integrated and multi-sectoral approach: “It is necessary to avoid duplication and fragmentation of interventions and ensure that allocation of funds be coherent, prioritized and based on the severity of needs, also by empowering local actors and involving communities”, the Permanent Representative of Italy to the International Organizations in Geneva, Ambassador Gian Lorenzo Cornado, said today in his address to the Humanitarian Affairs Segment of ECOSOC, taking place in Geneva from 24 to 26 June.
In his statement, Ambassador Cornado stressed the dramatic increase of people across the world in need of humanitarian assistance and the importance of ensuring compliance to International Humanitarian Law, taking into account also the new challenges that come, for example, from the proliferation of non-state armed groups, the use of improvised explosive devices in urban areas, the growing difficulty of distinguishing between combatants and civilians in military operations, terrorism and cyber-attacks.
In order to ensure humanitarian action to be more flexible and predictable, the Permanent Representative of Italy stressed the increased use, by the Italian Development Cooperation, to “un-earmarked” contributions to main International Organizations and multi-donor funds such as the “Central Emergency Response Fund” (CERF) and the “Country Based Pooled Funds” (CBPFs).
Ambassador Cornado also stressed, in his intervention, the importance of stimulating more efforts, both at the national and international level, in the field of disaster risk reduction, with initiatives aimed at strengthening preparedness of concerned countries, in a preemptive way, in addition to capacity to respond effectively to natural disasters. In this context, he recalled the positive Italian experience: in light of the fragility of its territory, Italy has developed valuable competence in both prevention and preparedness action, and in the emergency response and early recovery. Therefore – Ambassador Cornado said – Italy is more and more committed, not only to support our partners in their emergency response, but also in sharing know-how and expertise. (@OnuItalia)