Donetsk/Prague, Nov 27 (CTK) – Simon Panek, director of the Czech People in Need organisation, dismissed on Sunday the allegations by pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk, east Ukraine, that the organisation ignores critical comments on its activities, due to which it was stripped of its accreditation.
The separatists gave the humanitarian organisation 24 hours to leave the separatist territory.
They justified it by the “systemic ignoring” of their critical comments and by “creating corruption schemes.”
Panek told CTK that the separatists did not raise any objections to the activities of People in Need before and that he does not give up hope that a compromise will be found that will make it possible to supply humanitarian aid during the winter at least.
According to the separatists’ DAN press agency, the relevant accreditation committee explained the ban on the activities of the Czech organisation saying it “systemically ignored the committee’s objections to the implemented programmes of distribution of humanitarian aid,” “activities being at variance with the declared goals” and “destructive work having the form of creating corruption schemes in the distribution of humanitarian aid, which provoked conflicts not only among the recipients, but also local authorities.”
Panek dismissed this, saying Donetsk authorities did not raise any objections and that they did not provide any evidence and specific names now either.
Panek said People in Need works fully transparently and that it is financed by a group of large world donors, including the U.N. and the EU, while controls and audits found no systemic mistakes.
“I do not know what brought the Donetsk bodies to make a decision which I consider unfortunate at the beginning of winter. If they had any objections to our work, and if even the word corruption was pronounced, I wonder why they did not tell us about this and why they did not want us to remedy the situation. The accreditation was renewed on a weekly basis, which means that they were making a decision every week for more than one year on whether to grant us the accreditation, or not,” Panek told CTK.
“People in Need was the last international non-government organisation which operated in Donetsk. Now – unless we succeed in striking a compromise about our operation during the winter perhaps, when the people would badly need it – then there will be none,” Panek said.
DAN pointed out that the international organisation Doctors without Borders lost its accreditation in October 2015. The separatists accused it of “collecting data on defence” and of “an illegal supply of psychotropic substances.”
People in Need started providing humanitarian aid in Donetsk in November 2014.
It distributed food aid to almost 470,000 people in the regions that are not controlled by the central Ukrainian government this year.
The organisation helped another 100,000 people repair their dwellings and ensured access to drinking water and personal care items to 95,000 people.
People in Need continues to operate in eastern Ukraine in territories controlled by Kiev and in rebellious areas controlled from Luhansk.
