Valletta: No cash for Eritrea tyrant, EU Aid via NGO's/UN agencies, EU Dev. Chief!
12 November 2015
Speaking to Euronews reporter today at the end of the EU Africa Summit in Valletta, Malta, Neven Mimica, EU Commissioner for International Cooperation and Development, Mr. Neven Mimica, said in no uncertain terms that there is no cash for Eritrea tyrant, EU Aid via NGO's and UN agencies is the way EU intends to implement its Development Programs in Eritrea. Watch video clip below and read the relevant Q & A between Mimica and euronews below:
euronews: "Isn't the issue really that a lot of these countries that people are fleeing from, Eritrea for example, are countries which have a terrible record on human right abuses. Is there any real sum of development money that is going to change that?"
Neven Mimica: "I would say that we don't have other choice but to run in parallel the development programmes. We cannot avoid this and we shouldn't.
"We mustn't stop doing this kind of development migration dialogue just because there are risks that we would not be able to really influence the human rights and the democratic environment in our partner countries."
euronews: "So how will you monitor where this money is going, where will this money be spent exactly, will it be governments, will it be something else?"
Neven Mimica: "We do not intend and we do not plan to have direct budget supports through the government channels to finance the development projects.
"We would rather go through to our partners in implementation of these programmes and our partners are civil society organizations, NGOs and the national member states' national development agencies."
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