28 Mar 2022 13:54

Red Cross provides some 350 mln rubles to help refugees from Ukraine evacuated to Russia - Russian Red Cross

MOSCOW. March 28 (Interfax) - The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies will provide some 3.3 million Swiss Francs (some 346 million rubles) to the Russian Red Cross (RRC) to help refugees from the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics and Ukraine evacuated to Russia, RRC Chairman Pavel Savchuk said on Monday.

"To scale up our work, the International Committee of the Red Cross is ready to provide extra funding to us, some 1.3 million Swiss Francs. It will be used to buy vouchers, food, and essential goods, and this funding will also be used for reinforcing the work of regional divisions of the Russian Red Cross, which support refugees," Savchuk told a press conference on assistance to the residents of Donbas and Ukraine evacuated to Russia.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is ready to provide another two million Swiss Francs to help refugees in Russia, Savchuk said.

"Assistance and support will also be provided to the families of Russians who are taking their relatives, acquaintances and friends from Donbas and other cities in Ukraine, and we know that there are very many such families," Savchuk said.

Besides, refugees from Donbas and Ukraine who are staying at their Russian relatives' and friends' can seek humanitarian support from the Russian Red Cross divisions in their region.

According to earlier reports, ICRC President Peter Maurer held meetings with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Fomin, Russian Human Rights Commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova, and Russian Red Cross Chairman Pavel Savchuk in Moscow on March 23-24. He had also visited Kyiv before that. After the talks in Moscow, Maurer said Russia and Ukraine had already started providing to the ICRC captured people's data and were ready to give Red Cross officials access to the places where they were held. An agreement on ICRC financial assistance to the Russian Red Cross for humanitarian supplied to refugees from Donbas and Ukraine was also signed during the visit.