Italy to help rebuild disaster prone areas
Rasika Somarathna
|
Disaster Management and Human Rights Minister Mahinda
Samarasinghe exchanging MoUs with Head of Civil Defence in Italy
Brirta Lerso.
|
The Italian Government will provide a Rs. 750 million Aid package to
Sri Lanka to rebuild and develop areas which have been prone to natural
and man-made disasters and to improve technical efficiency of the
disaster management process.
The Italians have agreed to help Sri Lanka in their disaster
management efforts. This is after the recent visit of Minister for
Disaster Management and Human Rights, Mahinda Samarasinghe.
Accordingly an agreement was signed by Sri Lanka with the Civil
Defence Organisation of Italy, in the presence of President Giorgio
Napolitano.
Under the agreement this organisation has agreed to furnish Rs.450
million for development projects initiated by Disaster Management Centre
and Rs.300 million as technical aid. Ministry sources said the money
would be utilised for development as well as technical aid programmes
for officials in sectors such as disaster management, meteorology,
nation building and research, irrigation, coastal development and
geological survey and mines sector.
According to these sources the said Rs. 450 million had been granted
on a special request by the Minister to start flood control projects for
flood-prone areas such as Batticaloa, Ampara, Anuradhapura, Polonnaruwa
and Dambulla. Minister Samarasinghe on his visit had also taken steps to
brief the Italian President, Foreign Minister and the Minister of
Internal Affairs regarding the situation in Sri Lanka.
The Minister held extensive discussions regarding the CFA abbrogation
and Human Rights situation in view of eliminating misconceptions. |
