Growing calls to scrap foreign aid cuts as philanthropists step in to replace shortfall
There are growing calls for the government to reverse its plan to slash foreign aid spending, with Bill and Melinda Gates’s organisation among those announcing it will step in to fill the gap.
Labour and the Archbishop of Canterbury intensified their demands for the policy to be changed, saying the move by a consortium of charities underlines the harm caused by the decision.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), the ELMA Foundation and the Open Society Foundation are pledging £93m to a one-year plan to help replace the cuts in the UK’s aid budget, Sky News understands.
The Sunday Times has reported the funding will target projects tackling preventable diseases and family planning.
Mr Johnson’s government last year confirmed it would breach its own manifesto pledge by reducing “temporarily” to 0.5% from 0.7% the amount of national income spent on foreign aid because of the economic hit caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Since then, the UK has announced cuts to the UN agency that fights AIDS and HIV – more than 80% – and a former aid minister has said “far more” than 100,000 people will die as a result of them.
The Sunday Times said the plan by the consortium to put forward the shortfall was aimed at embarrassing Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Labour’s shadow international development secretary Preet Kaur Gill said in a statement: “This is a shameful moment for this Conservative government.
“As low income countries continue to battle against the pandemic, this contribution to try and plug some of the gap left by the government’s slashing of life saving aid programmes is welcome, but it will only be able to prevent the very worst of the damage caused.
“The government’s decision to cut the aid budget, against the wishes of parliament, has already cost lives and they must reverse it or put to a vote as soon as possible.”
The Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Rev Justin Welby told The Sunday Telegraph: “These diseases cause unimaginable suffering and entirely preventable deaths.
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Foreign aid cut is a ‘temporary measure’
“This emergency funding is welcome and desperately needed, but I continue to pray for the restoration of our promise to those living in extreme poverty around the world: which was to love them as our neighbour through our commitment to the 0.7% aid spending target.”
Former musician and Live Aid organiser Sir Bob Geldof added that it was “disgraceful” that private benefactors needed to step in because of the government’s “abandonment” of those needing aid.
The Daily Telegraph reported the one-year funding for neglected tropical diseases will go to Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Nepal, Nigeria, Sudan, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia – the nations most affected by the cuts.
Baroness Sugg, who resigned as a Foreign Office minister in protest at the cuts, added the government “must return to its promise next year to avoid permanently losing the progress made thanks to the generosity of British taxpayers”.
Chief executive officer of the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation Kate Hampton told The Daily Telegraph: “We are stepping in so that when the government returns to its commitments next year as promised, the progress made will not have been lost.”
A group of at least 30 Conservative MPs opposes the government cuts, with other senior figures like Sir John Major also voicing their discontent.
The ceasefire clock is ticking down and everyone in Gaza knows it.
In the calm, people have been flooding to hospitals looking for treatment – almost overwhelming doctors.
At a hospital in southern Gaza, a Sky News team filmed as patient after patient was brought in for treatment, many of them children, with undiagnosed illnesses.
Follow the Israel-Hamas war live, as more hostages are released
The hospital’s corridors were crammed, with the injured placed on rickety beds.
In one doctor’s room, mother after mother entered with their ill children, desperate for help.
There is a real fear of a major spread of disease among the civilians, who are largely homeless and barely finding enough food to survive.
Hygiene fears grow in Gaza
The head of the safety unit of the Ministry of Health in Gaza told Sky News the basic lack of hygiene and lack of clean water is making problems worse.
“There are many different types of diseases, such as skin diseases between the refugees, especially gut diseases and diarrhoea,” Estamily A’adeni explained.
“As you may know most of the displaced people have a basic lack of hygiene because of their evacuation, and lack of water hygiene, this is why we see an increase in some cases such as skin disease, respiratory illness, and children in particular are suffering from diarrhoea,” he added.
Mothers in a doctor’s room in Gaza
Estamily A’adeni in Gaza
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Aid deliveries have continued both to the south and the north of the Gaza Strip, and the quantity of it coming in has increased.
But aid agencies have consistently said it is hopelessly inadequate.
People are increasingly desperate, and they know that when the war resumes life will get even worse.
Hundreds of thousands have already moved south, and they face the very real prospect of having to move again.
Of course, the current ceasefire has been entirely dependent on the release of hostages in Gaza, and the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.
At the permanent vigil for hostages at a square in Tel Aviv, it’s clear that people are desperate for them to be returned.
At the same time though, there is widespread support for a resumption of the war on Hamas. And this is a conundrum for the Israeli government and the military – and Hamas of course always knew it would be.
This complex process has so far been remarkably successful, with negotiators staying in constant touch with both Israel and Hamas.
The vigil site itself is dominated by an enormous, fully dressed dinner table with place settings for all the hostages. Silhouetted pictures of people are hung over the back of chairs to symbolise that they’re still missing.
Vigil in Tel Aviv
Chairs without the pictures represent the hostages who have been released and are now in hospital or back with their families in Israel.
Hundreds of people wander around the square looking at installations – including bound and blindfolded toy dolls that represent the children being held.
A few gazebos have been set up by survivors of the various kibbutzim attacked by Hamas on 7 October. Pictures of the dead and missing from the individual kibbutz adorn the gazebos, and people come to mourn and chat with friends and relatives.
In the crowd I met Sandra Cohen. I asked her if she, like others here, believed the war against Hamas had to restart, and I asked her about the complexities of the IDF’s tactics – how to attack Hamas and get the hostages out.
“They have a dilemma because getting them out and having a full destruction of the tunnels could put them in harm’s way, so they take it day by day and they do it slowly, obviously they have drones that watch and see what’s happening, but they do want to get them back alive, and we just have to wait and see what happens.”
Former United States secretary of state Henry Kissinger has died aged 100.
He passed away at his home in Connecticut on Wednesday, according to a statement from Kissinger Associates Inc.
The veteran politician had major influence on American foreign policy under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.
Born in Germany in 1923, Mr Kissinger fled the Nazi regime with his family as a teenager and settled in the US in 1938.
During eight years as a national security adviser and secretary of state, Dr Kissinger was involved in major foreign policy events including the first example of “shuttle diplomacy” seeking peace in the Middle East, secret negotiations with China to defrost relations between the burgeoning superpowers and the instigation of the Paris peace talks seeking an end to the Vietnam conflict.
Dr Kissinger with President Gerald Ford and Chairman Mao Zedong in Beijing in 1975
Analysis: A ‘top diplomat’ for some, a ‘war criminal’ for others
In 1973 he was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to negotiate an end to the Vietnam War.
However, Dr Kissinger, along with President Nixon, also bore the brunt of criticism from the US’s allies following the fall of Saigon to North Vietnamese forces in 1975 as the remaining US personnel fled what is now known as Ho Chi Minh City.
Henry Kissinger meeting President Xi Jinping in Beijing earlier this year. Pic: AP
His influence over US diplomacy – which continued long after he left office – has not been without controversy, and some activists called for him to be prosecuted for war crimes.
He remained active in politics, even after his 100th birthday in May, attending meetings in the White House, publishing a book on leadership styles, and testifying before a Senate committee about the nuclear threat posed by North Korea.
In July 2023 he made a surprise visit to Beijing to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.
During his early life, after becoming a naturalised US citizen in 1943, Dr Kissinger joined the US Army the same year and was awarded a Bronze Star.
He would go on to serve with US counter intelligence in occupied Germany.
Dr Kissinger earned his bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD degrees at Harvard University, where he taught international relations for almost 20 years before President Nixon appointed him national security advisor in 1969.
Henry Kissinger with Richard Nixon and Israeli prime minister Golda Meir
He is survived by his wife of nearly 50 years, Nancy Maginnes Kissinger, two children by his first marriage, David and Elizabeth, and five grandchildren.
According to the statement from Kissinger Associates: “He will be interred at a private family service. At a later date, there will be a memorial service in New York City.”
Senator and former presidential candidate Mitt Romney paid tribute to Dr Kissinger on X describing him as a “great one” and saying: “Fortunate indeed is America for his lifetime of diplomacy, wisdom, and love of freedom.”
Winston Lord, former US ambassador to China and Dr Kissinger’s one time special assistant said: “The world has lost a tireless advocate for peace.
“America has lost a towering champion for the national interest. I have lost a cherished friend and mentor.
“Henry blended the European sense of tragedy and the American immigrant’s sense of hope.”
Cindy McCain, the wife of late Senator John McCain said: “Henry Kissinger was ever present in my late husband’s life.
“While John was a POW and in the later years as a Senator & statesman.
“The McCain family will miss his wit, charm, and intelligence terribly.”
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