The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation meets the regional governments to coordinate emergency aid for refugees following cold snap

Representatives of 15 regional governments attending the meeting, together with representatives of the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (Spanish acronym: FEMP). This meeting derives from the decisions taken at the Conference of Regional Presidents held on 17 January, which strongly urged the development cooperation bodies of the national and regional authorities to implement a coordinated plan for emergency aid for refugees affected by the cold snap in Europe.

In his speech, the State Secretary for International Cooperation and for Ibero-America highlighted his maximum interest in proposing and coordinating actions to the effect given by the 2012 Portugalete Agenda. Fernando Garcia Casas reiterated that Spain will meet its commitments taken on at an international level and will continue to closely and fully collaborate with humanitarian bodies in this crisis.

The Director of AECID, Luis Tejada, and the Director of the agency's Humanitarian Aid Office, Rafael de Prado, both stressed the need to develop actions within the framework of the mechanisms of the United Nations and the European Union.

In this regard, and as a first step, the State secretary announced a contribution from AECID, out of its contingency funds, for the sum of 500,000 euros, within the framework of the "Regional Refugee and Migrant Response Plan for Europe 2017" of the UNHCR and the IOM

Furthermore, the AECID called for regional governments to join up to the existing Joint Emergency Aid Programme Fund as an instrument for more effective and swifter coordination in humanitarian crises such as the current refugee crisis.

In turn, the representatives of the 15 regional governments present specified the actions being taken by their own authorities, including actions on countries of origin and transit, as well as those to help integrate refugees in their own regions.

The regional governments underlined the need to strengthen coordination between Central Government and the regional authorities on the issue of taking in refugees and called for identification and reception processes to be speeded up.

The meeting closed with a commitment by AECID to circulate an initial working draft of the Coordination Plan for Emergency Aid for Refugees on 10 February, which includes Central Government, regional governments and local authorities through FEMP.