Turkey, September 18: Turkey’s State Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek said that particularly vulnerable societies might be affected more by natural disasters.
“Turkey is supporting all international assistance programs aiming to extend humanitarian aid to countries in difficult condition without any racist, religious, linguistic and gender discrimination,” Cicek said during a meeting of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC) Ministers of Emergency Situations in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Cicek said Turkey’s humanitarian aid was on the rise in recent years, and therefore Turkey was defined as an “emerging donor country” by some international organizations.
The Turkish minister said Turkey had made 250 million USD of aid to various countries hit by natural disasters in 2005 and 2006, and constructed many government buildings, schools and houses in Kashmir.
Cicek said that Turkey extended some 31 million USD of aid to Myanmar, China, Pakistan, Indonesia, Romania, Moldova and many other disaster-hit countries, and the amount of Turkish aid to Iraq was over 11 million USD.
The minister also said that Turkey aimed to raise its humanitarian assistance in coming days.
Participants signed Baku declaration at the end of the meeting, which underlined importance of cooperation among member countries in case of an emergency.
—Agencies