European Union to provide $14.5 million food aid to North Korea

The European Union has announced that it would provide about $14.5 million dollars in emergency aid to feed more than some 650,000 North Koreans.

The bloc’s executive body, the European Commission, said that an agreement about how to monitor the delivery of assistance was struck with North Korea after its experts noticed the humanitarian crisis in that country last month, the New York Times reports.

“Increasingly desperate and extreme measures are being taken by the hard-hit North Koreans, including the widespread consumption of grass,” the European Commission said in a statement.

Reports suggest that between 1995 and 2008, the commission had spent around €124m on humanitarian aid to North Korea, but stopped in 2008 after determining that it was no longer necessary.

However, the seriousness of the situation there has now prompted the commission to alter its decision.

“The purpose of this aid package is to save the lives of at least 650,000 people who could otherwise die from lack of food. Our experts saw severely malnourished children in hospitals and nurseries where no treatment was available,” Kristalina Georgieva, a European commissioner, said in the statement.

The present food crisis in North Korea has been caused by the combination of floods last year, the coldest winter in 50 years, followed by an outbreak of foot and mouth disease.