Czech Embassy in Damascus may become sole distributor of EU aid to Syria

The Czech Foreign Ministry has confirmed getting an offer from EU Foreign Affairs Chief Federica Mogherini for the Czech Embassy in Damascus to become the sole distributor of EU humanitarian aid to Syria. I spoke to the Czech State Secretary for EU Affairs Tomáš Prouza about what this would entail and why the Czech embassy was selected for this demanding task.

People wait to leave the besieged town of Madaya, Syria, January 11, 2016, photo: CTK

“I think that there are two main reasons –one is technical –we are the only member state of the EU which still has an embassy in Syria and we are also Protective Power for the United States, so the first reason is our presence on the ground and the second is the very high quality of our ambassador in Syria - Ambassador Filipi who is very respected by most of the parties involved in the conflict, so the belief also is that she would be able to distribute the aid effectively and not only work with one of the groups. ”

Has the Czech Republic actually said “yes” or is it still assessing the offer?

Bohuslav Sobotka, Federica Mogherini, photo: CTK

"We said “yes” to Ms. Mogherini’s suggestion and now we are holding discussions to make sure we know what would be required and also how this could be done, because obviously EU assistance is something all the warring factions in Syria would be highly interested in, so we need to make sure we have a good key to distributing the aid and also that we can protect the security of the people who will be doing the work on the ground.”

Does the embassy have the necessary contacts to ensure the safe delivery of EU aid to different parts of the country?

“Our embassy in Syria has very good contacts. The ambassador and her team have always been in close touch with all the key parties in Syria, so I think this is the main reason why we were asked to do this – because of the close contacts we have with all the factions. ”

I believe that we have a ten member team at the embassy in Damascus at present, would that be sufficient for such a demanding task?

Tomáš Prouza, photo: Anna Duchková

“We will see what sort of assistance the EU will be delivering, because if it is primarily money that would be used to buy things locally then that would be much easier than distributing physical goods for example. So that is why we are now in a very intense dialogue with Brussels, with the EC, about what the aid would be and, if needed, we would, of course, beef up the team.”

What time-frame are we looking at- when would this be launched?

“Our hope is to have the discussions finalized as quickly as possible. I think we have a few weeks, definitely not months, because there are many areas in Syria that need the assistance right away so that is why the discussions are going so quickly and so intensively. ”