We attended an event titled 'UK Helps' on 17 March in the Z Arts Centre. This event brought representatives from DFID and the Foreign Office to talk about the UK's aid to Syria.
The representative from the Foreign Office summarised the UK's involvement in Syria, namely that it is participating in a military intervention against Da'esh, but is also offering humanitarian support (both short and long term). The DFID representative spoke in greater detail about the humanitarian support that was being provided, namely through the UN and other NGOs, as well as through the 4 February London Donors conference.
The attendees raised a number of pertinent questions to the two representatives. We raised the following issues specifically:
1. In terms of the UK's involvement in Syria and its response to the humanitarian crisis, how is it that Assad's name was not mentioned? Is this indicative of a policy shift from the UK?
2. In terms of humanitarian support that is being provided for Syria, why aren't Syrian NGOs being consulted for funding priorities, and shouldn't they be given priority for funding?
Other important questions were raised pertaining to the Government's scheme for resettling refugees into the UK, and the lack of communication between local and central Government.
Overall, most of the attendees did not feel that the Government officials answered our questions satisfactorily. They conceded that they should keep the focus on Assad, and noted constraints from funding Syrian NGOs directly. They were even challenged by one of the audience members as to how they could attend such an event without preparation on basic issues, most importantly the Government scheme for resettling refugees.
