emergency.lu

As part of emer​gency​.lu, Lux­em­bourg also con­tributed to ETC’s ​“Ser­vices for com­mu­ni­ties Sahel” project, which aims to bridge the dig­i­tal divide in the cen­tral Sahel and meet the infor­ma­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tion needs of com­mu­ni­ties. Through the pro­vi­sion of basic telecom­mu­ni­ca­tion ser­vices, ETC will ensure that com­mu­ni­ties in Niger, Burk­i­na Faso and Mali have access to the tools need­ed to access poten­tial­ly life-sav­ing infor­ma­tion, and a basic com­mu­ni­ca­tion net­work. The first site has been oper­a­tional in Dif­fa since mid-2023.

The cri­sis in Sudan and the con­flict in Dar­fur have led to the loot­ing and destruc­tion of a large num­ber of UN offices, guest­hous­es and ware­hous­es through­out the region, as well as the evac­u­a­tion of inter­na­tion­al staff and the relo­ca­tion of nation­al staff. For exam­ple, the UN launched activ­i­ties in Farchana, Chad, one hour from the bor­der. Fol­low­ing an ini­tial request from OCHA, the Inter­na­tion­al Human­i­tar­i­an Part­ner­ship (IHP) has sent an eval­u­a­tion mis­sion to the region. The team con­sist­ed of an employ­ee from the Min­istry and a mem­ber of the CGDIS group respon­si­ble for human­i­tar­i­an mis­sions. In addi­tion, the Min­istry has made avail­able a light base camp from its stores and an emer​gency​.lu satel­lite com­mu­ni­ca­tion sys­tem has been installed in Farchana. The eval­u­a­tion team rec­om­mend­ed the instal­la­tion of semi-per­ma­nent infra­struc­ture (using con­tain­ers), and imple­men­ta­tion is planned for ear­ly 2024 by Lux­em­bourg and Sweden.