Finland announces to resume funding for UN agency for Palestinian refugees

By Leila Nezirevic

LONDON (AA) - Finland will lift a freeze on aid to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), the foreign trade and development minister announced on Friday.

Following the unproven Israeli accusation that some UNRWA staffers were involved in the Oct. 7 attacks, many countries, including Finland, suspended payments to the aid agency in late January, pending an investigation.

"UNRWA improving its risk management, that is, preventing and initiating close monitoring for misconduct, provides sufficient guarantees for us at this point in time to continue our support," Foreign Trade and Development Minister Ville Tavio said at a press conference in Helsinki.

The Finish decision came after the European Commission announced earlier this month that it would release €50 million (approximately $54.7 million) in UNRWA funding.

Shortly after the commission announced its decision, Sweden and Canada resumed aid, citing the humanitarian situation in Gaza.

Earlier, Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Espen Barth Eide urged the world to stand by the agency, saying, “Now is exactly the wrong time to halt funding for UNRWA.”

“If these decisions are not reversed, we run a serious risk of worsening the dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” he said in a statement issued by the Foreign Ministry.

UNRWA was established by the UN General Assembly more than 70 years ago to assist Palestinians who were forcibly displaced from their land.

The agency provides crucial support to millions of Palestinian refugees in the Gaza Strip, West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and other areas where large numbers of registered Palestinians live.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini accused Tel Aviv of having a “long-term political goal” of “destroying” the UN aid agency, as well as the idea that Palestinians are refugees with a right to return home one day, the Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger reported.

“At the moment, we are dealing with an expanded, concentrated Israeli campaign, which is aimed at destroying UNRWA,” Lazzarini said in the interview published last month.

Over 32,000 Palestinians have been killed, mostly women and children while tens of thousands are injured, missing, or uncounted for, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

The United Nations warned the Security Council earlier this month of “imminent famine in the Gaza Strip”, urging immediate action to prevent a humanitarian disaster in a territory where many council members warned that Israel is using “hunger as a weapon of war.”

At least 576,000 people in Gaza – one-quarter of the population – are “one step away from famine,” said Ramesh Rajasingham, the director of coordination at the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, according to a UN press release.

The food-security experts warn of “complete agricultural collapse in northern Gaza by May” if conditions persist, said the UN.

“Unfortunately, as grim as the picture we see today is, there is every possibility for further deterioration,” Rajasingham reported.