New centre for humanitarian aid to be established

Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek announced on Wednesday that the Czech Ministry for Foreign Affairs is to establish a new centre to coordinate development and humanitarian projects abroad. Foreign aid experts had complained in the past that Czech humanitarian aid was inefficient because it lacked a unified system, which led to individual ministries often drafting and implementing projects independently of each other. A draft bill on establishing the development centre is expected to be ready by the end of the year.

The Czech Republic allocated around 3.6 billion crowns (approximately 180 million US dollars) for foreign development aid last year. This money mainly went to projects in so-called priority countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Angola, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Yemen, Moldova, Mongolia, Serbia, Montenegro, Vietnam and Zambia.

Author: Coilin O'Connor