The European Union’s Commissioner for International Cooperation, Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Response, Kristalina Georgieva, today arrived in Bosnia and Herzegovina to see at first hand the effects of the recent devastating floods in the country.
At the press conference on her arrival she said:
“Dobar dan,
I want to start by expressing my deepest sympathy to those who lost family members, friends, homes or livelihoods. It is an enormous tragedy and it is one that has created a great deal of empathy among all of us in Europe.
We have responded immediately to the request for emergency assistance from BiH and I can tell you that today almost 150 Europeans are here from 16 countries with helicopters, pumps, boats and lifesaving equipment. And still more are coming because of the sheer scale of floods that have affected the country.
We are at the emergency phase where the most important objective is to reduce the risk of loss of life and damage. I was briefed just an hour and a half ago on the priority to prevent further breaking of the dam wall and actually, as we are speaking in this room, helicopters are delivering bags to strengthen the wall and prevent further flooding. And I want also to recognise EUFOR. Up to now, they have conducted nearly 160 evacuations and life-saving flights. 800 people are alive because these helicopters are there.
Next, we will move towards humanitarian assistance. Those who lost their homes – 3,000 landslides have led to a lot of damage to homes of people – will need generators for electricity, water purification systems so they have clean water, food, shelter, mattresses, beds, medical assistance. This is now our priority, to fund humanitarian activities and respond to requests that the government is putting to us. And as the Minister indicated – as soon as possible we need to move to work on an assessment of the damage and then tasks for reconstruction so the country and communities affected return to a functional level, hopefully more resilient to the future floods. And of course, the European Union will express solidarity with the country at this stage.
I have been a Commissioner for four and a half years and I have seen every imaginable disaster you can think of – earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, conflicts – and always, always Europe will be the strongest force for good and of course we will do this for our neighbourhood.
The minister mentioned Haiti, Pakistan, I would add Japan and of course Central Europe, when Central Europe was affected by floods, but I want to leave you with one important message. Because of climate change disasters like this, floods, but also forest fires, slides are becoming more frequent and more severe. Our region is most at risk to floods, summer heat and forest fires, they will continue to come, they hit as with even greater force. It is important to act swiftly and decisively as we do now when the disaster happens, but it is equally if not more important to invest and prepare these preventions so we are more resilient to these shocks, and less of people’s property is affected.
One Euro, one convertible Mark, one Dollar, one Yen, invested in preparedness and preventions saves 4 to 7 times more in damages when the disaster occurs. I don’t know many investments that bring more then 400 to 700 hundred percent in return. And this is why I hope, as we move towards the reconstruction, we will also integrate an approach, or a mind-set of preparedness and prevention; because, if we don’t do that, it will be yet again a tragedy in the future to occur, hit us with the same strength or worse than we face today. But now we have job to do, to help people, and straight from here I will go to see the impact of the floods and to see what more we can do to help.
Thank you.”
