Original text
European Commission - Speech [Check Against Delivery] Press Remarks by Commissioner Lahbib at the Foreign Affairs Council on Development Dublin, 9 October 2026 Yesterday evening we discussed the future of development, along with the important link between humanitarian aid and development, together with key stakeholders. Today we turned to the humanitarian challenges and the reform of the humanitarian system. Why does...
European Commission - Speech [Check Against Delivery] Press Remarks by Commissioner Lahbib at the Foreign Affairs Council on Development Dublin, 9 October 2026 Yesterday evening we discussed the future of development, along with the important link between humanitarian aid and development, together with key stakeholders. Today we turned to the humanitarian challenges and the reform of the humanitarian system. Why does this matter? Because nearly 240 million people depend on aid to stay alive. They are in Ukraine, Ethiopia, the DRC, Gaza, Afghanistan, Haiti, Yemen, and the Rohingya refugee camps. There are more than 130 active conflicts in the world, and humanitarian aid and access are being used as weapons of war. Humanitarian work has become harder and more dangerous. Warehouses are full of food and medicine, while people a few kilometres away go hungry. Aid and medical workers, protected by international humanitarian law, are arrested, kidnapped, and deliberately targeted. Last year was the deadliest on record: more than 300 aid workers killed. Funding cuts make all this harder, so Europe has to stand firm. Together, as Team Europe, we remain one of the world's largest humanitarian donors. We are focusing on three areas: protecting aid workers, delivering aid faster and more efficiently, and thinking differently to bring everyone on board, strengthening humanitarian-development-peace nexus, and engaging with the private sector. First, we must protect aid workers, wherever they are under threat. We all see the headlines. Just last week, in Sudan, an airstrike killed a WFP driver while he was delivering aid, and this is becoming the norm. That is why humanitarian diplomacy must be part of our foreign policy. It can get an aid convoy past a checkpoint or to keep the lights on in a hospital. I took that message to the UN General Assembly in New York last week, with partners from the Global South and EU countries. Humanitarian diplomacy means negotiating with everyone who controls access. It can open doors for aid and stop a crisis from spiralling. Often it is the last channel left when political dialogue has broken down. Aid workers wake up every morning asking one simple question: How can I help? They are not targets. We must protect them. Next week I will co-chair a conference on protecting aid workers with the Irish presidency. We will look at what is working and where we must do better. We are also expanding our Protect Aid Workers support for survivors of attacks. Second, we need to make the humanitarian system faster and more accountable. The UN is going through its UN80 reform and the Humanitarian Reset, and the EU is fully behind it. Budgets are shrinking, so every euro has to work harder. That is why we are calling for reform of humanitarian supply chains. Logistics account for between 60% to 80% of humanitarian spending. A euro saved on transport can buy bread or a vaccine for a child. We need more cooperation and less duplication. Most organisations run their own logistics and their own warehouses. We want them to buy together and share transport and storage, all the way to the last mile. Our third focus is partnerships. Aid alone never ends a crisis. We need to make better use of the combined strength of our humanitarian, development, and peace efforts. We can only address fragility, whether caused by conflicts or climate, by acting in a more integrated way. We have the tools, but they need to work together, not in silos. Staying engaged in fragile countries must be a political priority for Europe. The consequences of fragility do not stop at borders. It shows up as hunger, disease outbreaks, conflict, displacement, and radicalisation. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development currently lists 18 extremely fragile countries. We will look at each of these countries individually, with an integrated approach built for each. With tight budgets, we also need new resources. That means working more closely with the private sector. Public-private partnerships and stronger local businesses help countries move faster from emergency aid to standing on their own feet. We need bold, innovative finance even in the most fragile countries to reduce risk and challenge the assumption that these markets are too risky to invest in. We already have initiatives that show it can be done. Now we need to scale them up. Together with the World Economic Forum, we will soon launch InvestFrontier . It will help humanitarian and international organisations work with businesses, philanthropies, and development banks to bring investment into fragile countries. I am pleased that the Council and Parliament are sending the same signal: Europe is united behind strong and principled humanitarian action. This is Europe acting as one. SPEECH/26/2129 <@rel_link@>
Speech Brief