UK seeks partnership with Qatari NGOs in Syria
Date
1/19/2016 9:50:23 PM
(MENAFN- The Peninsula) Desmond Swayne British Minister of State at the Department for International Development speaking to The Peninsula.
By Fazeena Saleem
DOHA: A senior British diplomat has lauded Qatar’s humanitarian initiatives in conflict-torn Syria and said the UK is seeking opportunities for collaboration with Qatari organisations in this field.
Desmond Swayne the British Minister of State at the Department for International Development who was on an official visit here told The Peninsula that the Department is looking at projects which could be implemented for Syrian refugees together with the charitable and non-governmental organisations in Qatar.
“We are interested in developing a collaborative relationships with Qatar. We are currently working on an education initiative together with Education Above All. We have been seeing a number of organisations and all are keen to collaborate and enter into a mechanism with us” Swayne said in an interview.
“We want to have partnership with others to reach where we can’t normally reach and where we don’t have permission to operate” he added.
He said the role played by Qatar in humanitarian efforts particularly in putting people on ground in Syria is significant and it should be taken as a model by other countries.
Swayne was on a two-day visit to Qatar ahead of the Syria Donors Conference 2016 to be held next month in London.
The conference is jointly hosted by the United Nations the UK Kuwait Germany and Norway.
It will follow on previous conferences held in Kuwait.
The conference will bring together leaders from countries around the world NGOs and civil society groups to raise more funds to meet the needs of all internally displaced Syrians and refugees in neighbouring countries identify long-term funding solutions covering 2016 and following years and address the long-term needs of those affected by the crisis by identifying ways to create jobs and provide education.
“We want to raise the level of ambition to fully fund the needs of Syrians within Syria and the refugees. We also want to move to a much more predictable and reasonable funding” said Swayne.
“ The ambition of the conference is to be able to announce that every refugee child in Jordan and Lebanon will be in education at the end of the academic year 2016-2017. That is a very high level of ambition but that is the aim” he added.
The challenge is high with 200000 Syrian refugees registered for schooling according to Swayne.
He said the UK is a leading donor among those responded to the humanitarian response. To date the country has committed more than £1.1bn in humanitarian funding.
This is for providing support such as food shelter medical care and clean drinking water to hundreds of thousands of Syrians affected by the conflict both inside Syria and outside the British Minister added.
The Peninsula