00:00Moving on with humanitarian needs in Venezuela skyrocketing since the earthquake last week,
00:05the European Union has sent 5 million euro in aid. For more on the situation on the ground,
00:10our Lauren Walker spoke to Joao Almeida de Silva from the EU's Emergency Response
00:14Coordination Centre. He's stationed at an operations base in La Guardia Stadium in the
00:19city of Macuto, the hardest hit area. We are progressing and unfortunately the time limit
00:25and the clock is ticking in order as related to the retrieval and of still possible survivals.
00:34Still, there are teams working, so there is still hope, but unfortunately we are now entering
00:39the second stage, more of this operation. So the teams will start to demobilize probably
00:45towards the end of the week and as from tomorrow and after tomorrow. And then we will enter into
00:51the second stage, so some more health and medical and in-kind assistance and humanitarian aid.
00:56What has your work there been like so far? Can you tell us a bit more about what you've been
01:01doing there?
01:01So our work is to coordinate, to facilitate and to work with local authorities in order to speed up
01:07as much as possible that these teams can go into the terrain and work. We are also to coordinate
01:13what is the incoming also assistance and all humanitarian aid that is about to come. We had
01:20already one flight of really few that landed here on Monday, coming from Copenhagen with almost 50
01:25tons of assistance. And this will be our work now for the next days as we demobilize the teams from
01:33section rescue and move into more health and in-kind assistance provision in Venezuela.
01:38Now reports are coming from the ground in Venezuela with some people suggesting that a lot of the
01:45help is coming from international aid like you're providing and from citizens and that the state and
01:50the army are very much absent in these operations. Is this something, does this correspond with what
01:56you're seeing on the ground?
01:58Well, it's difficult to enter. We know all the political situation here in Venezuela, but this is
02:04what we have here. It's with the army that we have to work and the other ones in control of
02:09the airport
02:10of the port. So, well, our strategic points in terms of logistics to bring assistance in.
02:15The EU has pledged 5 million euros in support. However, there are preliminary reports that suggest that
02:21actually the damage that has done, it could cost up to 11 billion dollars. Would you say that the support
02:27that is being given now this financial aid is a drop in the ocean when you see the damage that
02:33these
02:33earthquakes have done?
02:35I would like my comments on this for my colleagues from the humanitarian side, as we are here
02:40representing civil protection, so more on the response side. But definitely what we see is that
02:46there's going to be a huge need to support Venezuela. The figures speak for themselves in terms of
02:51deceased people, but also especially of the disappeared people or missing people still. So what we see is that
02:57there is in the loom massive health crisis that will unfold in the coming days or weeks also,
03:03because the weather is extremely hot, extremely humid. So we suspect now that health will be the
03:08critical issue for the next weeks to come.
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