"The Arab League does its utmost to contain the unrest in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya and Gaza Strip in collaboration with the concerned UN agencies," Sheikh Sabah, leading an Arab delegation on a visit to Switzerland, told KUNA.
"In the presence of Secretary-General of the Arab League Dr. Nabil Al-Araby the delegation discussed the humanitarian situations in these hotspots with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres and the Director of OCHA Geneva Rashid Khalikov separately," he noted.
"The meeting with Guterres reviewed the outcomes of the two sessions of the International Humanitarian Pledging Conference for Syria, hosted by Kuwait in 2013 and 2014, and the extent of the international donors to their pledges as well as the aid programs of the UN agencies for the victims of the Syrian conflict inside the country and in neighboring countries.
"Guterres has apprised the Arab delegation of the status of the Syrian internally-displaced and Syrian refugees in neighboring countries those numbers topped seven million and three million respectively," Sheikh Sabah disclosed.
He reaffirmed the keenness of Kuwait and the League on working with the UN agencies for alleviating the suffering of the displaced Syrians and Iraqis and addressing the humanitarian disaster in Gaza as a result of the Israeli aggression over the last 45 days.
"The UN refugee agency UNHCR plays a great role in addressing the humanitarian situations in cooperation with the League and Kuwait," Sheikh Sabah stressed.
He added that Dr. Al-Araby, accompanied by Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyadh Al-Maliki visited the HQ of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Swiss Foreign Ministry earlier today.
The current visit to Switzerland is part of the League’s lobbying for an international conference to discuss how to enforce the Fourth Geneva Convention (GC-IV) relating to the protection of civilians in time of war.
"The next step for the Arab delegation will be a visit to the UN HQ in New York where we will be holding separate meetings with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and President of the Security Council pursuant to the decision of the Emergency Arab Foreign Ministers’ Meeting held in Cairo on July 14," he revealed.
The League will send specialized teams to Gaza Strip, Yemen, Iraq and Libya to assess the needs of vulnerable people there besides the regular revision of the humanitarian situation of the displaced Syrians, he added.
The meetings were attended by Kuwait’s permanent delegate to the UN Office in Geneva Ambassador Jamal Al-Ghoneim, Ambassador to Switzerland Bader Al-Tanib and deputy chief of staff of the office of the first prime minister Ambassador Salah Alloghani.
