Portuguese Foreign Minister João Gomes Cravinho on Saturday appealed to Israel to allow the country to increase aid access points in the Gaza Strip, where there is “a humanitarian emergency.”
“We are facing a humanitarian emergency. It is absolutely essential that there is more aid capacity to enter Gaza, to alleviate the human suffering of that population,” the head of Portuguese diplomacy defended on Saturday at the end of a meeting with his Egyptian counterpart, Sameh Shoukry, as part of a joint visit he made to the Middle East with the Slovenian Foreign Minister, Tanja Fajon.
Gomes Cravinho defended the need to “increase the number of access points”.
‘At the moment everything comes in through the Rafah Pass [sul da Faixa, na fronteira com o Egito]a passage primarily intended for light vehicles, while other possibilities have already been prepared next to it, for merchandise, on a much larger scale,” he indicated.
“We especially call on Israel, which holds the key to the issue, to allow greater humanitarian access, because the people of Gaza – those who survived, because many were killed – are currently in a situation of famine is in. There is an absolute need to guarantee at least decent living conditions for the people of Gaza,” the head of Portuguese diplomacy stressed.
When the second day of the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, agreed between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas, is celebrated, around 200 trucks enter the area every day.
“However, we need much more, because the people of Gaza have had very little access to humanitarian aid in recent weeks,” he noted, reiterating the need to continue the ceasefire, which is currently expected to last four days. to extend.
Gomes Cravinho also urged a “consensual point” at the level of the European Union: “It is essential that the people of Gaza are not forced to leave Gaza, there should be no displacement of the population outside Gaza,” he stressed.
The two European ministers’ trip to Egypt also included a meeting with President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, culminating a two-day visit that previously visited Israel, Palestine and Jordan.
Source: DN
