On Wednesday, the United States announced that it would send around $414 million in humanitarian relief to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a country where roughly a quarter of its inhabitants, or over 25 million people, are in need of such assistance.
A sizeable portion of the funds will go to United Nations organizations and relief groups that provide emergency food assistance, healthcare and nutrition support, shelter, water, sanitation, and cleanliness, according to U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture Jeffrey Prescott, who spoke with Reuters.
“This funding also includes direct support (of) agricultural commodities from American farmers,” stated Prescott, who together with U.S. Ambassador to the DRC Lucy Tamlyn will formally announce the aid on Wednesday in Kinshasa.
Prescott stated that the entire amount of U.S. financing for DRC since October is now $838 million.
Since 2022, the army of the Democratic Republic of the Congo has been fighting M23 insurgents. Recently, violence in the east of the nation has forced over 1.7 million people from their homes, bringing the total number of Congolese displaced by different conflicts to a record 7.2 million, according to statistics from the United Nations.
The World Health Organization issued a warning last month that over a million children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are at risk of acute malnutrition, and just one-third of the $2.6 billion in aid requested by the UN for the country this year has been provided.
Prescott stated that he hoped other nations will “step up as well” and assist DRC as a result of US support. He added that the United States will give 50,000 mpox vaccinations and $10 million for health support.
