By Olivia Le Poidevin
GENEVA (Reuters) – (This April 25 story has been corrected to add new context and replace the quote in paragraphs 3 and 4 to clarify that no programmes are fully suspended, but some are being reduced in scope. It also corrects the sum in the UNHCR appeal to $550 million, not $3.32 billion, which is the total for the overall UN-wide appeal, in paragraph 6)
The United Nations’ refugee agency has had to reduce support for newly displaced people in Ukraine as frontline attacks intensify, it said on Friday, blaming the suspension of U.S. aid and broader donor cuts.
Across the world, humanitarian agencies are grappling with the impact of U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw foreign aid.
The agency said it had had to reduce the reach of some programmes that it had previously implemented with U.S. support, including the psycho-social support that is needed on a huge scale, as well as material for emergency shelters, and cash assistance. “We have had to put some of these partially on hold or we are prudent in the way we are implementing, because of course we cannot spend more than what we have mobilised funding for,” Karolina Lindholm Billing, UNHCR Representative in Ukraine, told reporters via a videolink.
The loss of U.S. aid, which last year accounted for 40% of UNHCR funding, has had the most impact, but other Western donors have also retreated as they prioritise defence spending.
As a result, the agency said its appeal for $550 million for its work in Ukraine was only 25% funded.
“We had to reduce the number of people we are prioritising,” Billing said, urging donors to provide funding.
Since January, almost 9,000 people fleeing heavy shelling in Ukraine have passed through UNHCR’s transit centres in Pavlohrad and Sumy, where it is providing clothes, hygiene kits, and legal and psycho-social support.
“They have arrived with little or no belongings and deeply traumatised,” Billing added.
More than 200,000 people have been evacuated or displaced from frontline areas between August last year and March, according to the agency.
Several regions, including the Kyiv area, and cities of Kharkiv and Pavlohrad have come under attack in recent days, at a critical moment in Russia’s war in Ukraine, as Trump strives to achieve his pledge of a rapid peace deal.
(Reporting by Olivia Le Poidevin; Editing by Ludwig Burger, Barbara Lewis and by Kevin Liffey)
