Caroline Gennez, the Minister for Development Cooperation in Belgium, announced on Thursday that she will propose sending a team from B-FAST to Kherson, Ukraine. B-FAST is the rapid
response team of the Belgian government that is deployed abroad in the event of significant disasters.
The region around Kherson in Ukraine has experienced severe flooding after the destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam on Tuesday. Gennez expressed her support for sending a B-FAST team to provide assistance, citing their hands-on experience and recent deployment to Italy to address flooding.
The proposal will be discussed in the Council of Ministers tomorrow. Gennez emphasized the importance of coordinating efforts and collaborating with existing relief organizations on the ground to avoid any overlap or interference.
The call for assistance comes in response to criticism from Ukraine's President, Volodymyr Zelensky, regarding the international response to the disaster. Zelensky expressed the need for large-scale efforts and expressed disappointment that certain international organizations were not present in the affected areas. He also raised concerns about Russian soldiers shooting at rescuers during evacuation attempts.
The flooding has resulted in the reported deaths of five individuals so far, marking the first confirmed casualties from the disaster. The responsible party behind the destruction of the dam has not yet been determined. While the head of Russian-occupied areas in Kherson suggested potential military benefits for Russia from the floods, the US think tank Institute for the Study of War concluded that the dam burst had a detrimental impact on Russian army defense lines along the Dnipro River. Photo by GennadyL., Wikimedia commons.