Former UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Sir Mark Lowcock, expressed concerns that the UK has been diverting Afghanistan and Yemen relief money to help Ukraine refugees. Moreover, in an interview conducted by award-winning reporter Rob Hastings. Sir Lowcock said he is deeply worried over the British government’s cutting down of budgets in helping victims of famine and conflicts, considering that the Ukraine crisis has made matters worse.
While it is obvious that Russia’s inhumane attacks against hospitals, schools and recently a railway station in Ukraine, have been destroying lives, the other victims of Russian invasions are reportedly being abandoned by the UK government’s aid cuts.
Cutting Aid and Diverting Relief Money Will Result in Greater Loss of Lives
Sir Lowcock who has been UK’s highest-ranking British official in the UN from 2017 up to 2021, said that diverting aid money intended fro the starving people of poor countries in order to deal with the crisis in Ukraine is not right. It will actually result in the largest loss of lives, as many refugees who sought refuge in poor countries will die of starvation, in addition to the increasing body count of victims in Ukraine. The aid cuts make the UK government as guilty as anybody else.
Through a video call interview from his home in south-west London, Sir Lowcock also criticised proposed policies of sending to Rwanda those who seek asylum in the UK. After almost four decades of being at the forefront of aid programs, which culminated in his UN work, Sir Lowcock feels he has to speak out, which he did so in his new book Relief Chief.