The United Nations intends to collect $158 million to help 2 million residents of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts and also the internally displaced people affected by Russia’s war against Ukraine.
UN representatives named this figure at a Jan. 29 meeting with foreign embassies and other donors that was held in Kyiv, where the UN outlined the main humanitarian needs in a special plan.
The international organization plans to use the money to repair civilian infrastructure on both sides of the front line, provide water to the local population, help with heating homes in the winter, bring doctors to sick people, provide money the poor and also offer psychological assistance to those who need it.
“The conflict is still very active,” Osnat Lubrani, the UN resident and humanitarian coordinator in Ukraine, told the media. “Almost on a daily basis I hear that either a school has been shot or a water infrastructure (site damaged).” She added that this affects the daily lives of people living in the area.
Russia’s war against Ukraine has claimed about 14,000 lives, including over 3,340 civilians who were killed on both sides of the frontline, UN data shows.
In the sixth year of the war, there are significantly fewer open hostilities than when it began in 2014. In 2019, 27 civilians were killed by shelling or mine explosions, less than in previous years of the conflict. Several more people also died while standing in long lines to cross between government-controlled and occupied territory, according to Alice Sequi, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Ukraine. Additionally, 140 civilians were injured because of the war in 2019.
The UN says that, of all the people living in war-torn Donbas, the most vulnerable are the elderly, children, people with disabilities and internally displaced persons. Additionally, people living within 20 kilometers of either side of the front line are also highly vulnerable.
The UN plans to help 528,000 elderly people, 327,000 children, 176,000 people with disabilities and 220,000 internally displaced persons directly or through its partners.
The highest need can be found among people living outside the areas of Ukrainian government control. The UN wants to help 910,000 people living there and also 850,000 people living on the government-controlled side.
However, there is little chance that all this money will be raised. In 2019, the UN managed to collect only $82 million, just a little more than half of the planned $164 million.
“Money we need is not money we have,” Lubrani said.
