Belgium will send €5 million worth of aid to Turkey and Syria, in addition to medical help already provided, following Monday's deadly earthquakes. Two-thirds of the fund will go towards helping Syria.
Belgium's Minister for Development Cooperation Caroline Gennez announced on Wednesday that the Belgian Government had decided to aid local organisations on site who have first-hand knowledge of the regions by the tremors.
Gennez indicated that Belgium wanted to prioritise assisting Syrians, which had proven "problematic" due to the ongoing civil war that has beset the country throughout the last decade.
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As a result, €4 million of the announced aid will go to the "cross-border" fund set up by the United Nations, which enables local organisations to provide assistance across borders and lines of conflict.
The other million will be sent to the Disaster Response Emergency Fund (DREF), managed by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).
