{"id":375447,"date":"2025-12-29T06:49:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T06:49:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/375447\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T06:49:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T06:49:08","slug":"us-pledges-2b-for-un-humanitarian-aid-as-trump-slashes-funding-and-warns-agencies-to-adapt-or-die","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/375447\/","title":{"rendered":"US pledges $2B for UN humanitarian aid as Trump slashes funding and warns agencies to \u2018adapt or die\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Critics say the Western aid cutbacks have been shortsighted, driven millions toward hunger<\/a>, displacement or disease, and harmed U.S. soft power<\/a> around the world.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"\/<\/p>\n

A year of crisis in aid<\/p>\n

The move caps a crisis year for many U.N. organizations like its refugee, migration and food aid agencies. The Trump administration has already cut billions in U.S. foreign aid<\/a>, prompting them to slash spending, aid projects and thousands of jobs. Other traditional Western donors have reduced outlays, too.<\/p>\n

The announced U.S. pledge for aid programs of the United Nations \u2014 the world\u2019s top provider of humanitarian assistance and biggest recipient of U.S. humanitarian aid money \u2014 takes shape in a preliminary deal with the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA, run by Tom Fletcher, a former British diplomat and government official. <\/p>\n

Even as the U.S. pulls back its aid, needs have ballooned across the world: Famine has been recorded this year in parts of conflict-ridden Sudan<\/a> and Gaza<\/a>, and floods, drought and natural disasters that many scientists attribute to climate change have taken many lives or driven thousands from their homes.<\/p>\n

The cuts will have major implications for U.N. affiliates like the International Organization for Migration<\/a>, the World Food Program and refugee agency UNHCR. They have already received billions less from the U.S. this year than under annual allocations from the previous Biden administration \u2014 or even during Trump\u2019s first term. <\/p>\n

Now, the idea is that Fletcher\u2019s office \u2014 which last year set in motion a \u201chumanitarian reset\u201d to improve efficiency, accountability and effectiveness of money spent \u2014 will become a funnel for U.S. and other aid money that can be then redirected to those agencies, rather than scattered U.S. contributions to a variety of individual appeals for aid. <\/p>\n

US seeks aid consolidation<\/p>\n

The United States wants to see \u201cmore consolidated leadership authority\u201d in U.N. aid delivery systems, said a senior State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity to provide details before the announcement at the U.S. diplomatic mission in Geneva.<\/p>\n

Under the plan, Fletcher and his coordination office \u201care going to control the spigot\u201d on how money is distributed to agencies, the official said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis humanitarian reset at the United Nations should deliver more aid with fewer tax dollars \u2014 providing more focused, results-driven assistance aligned with U.S foreign policy,\u201d said U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Michael Waltz.<\/p>\n

U.S. officials say the $2 billion is just a first outlay to help fund OCHA\u2019s annual appeal for money, announced earlier this month. Fletcher, noting the upended aid landscape, already slashed the request this year<\/a>. Other traditional U.N. donors like Britain, France, Germany and Japan have reduced aid allocations and sought reforms this year. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe agreement requires the U.N. to consolidate humanitarian functions to reduce bureaucratic overhead, unnecessary duplication, and ideological creep,\u201d the State Department said in a statement. \u201cIndividual U.N. agencies will need to adapt, shrink, or die.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cNowhere is reform more important than the humanitarian agencies, which perform some of the U.N.\u2019s most critical work,\u201d the department added. \u201cToday\u2019s agreement is a critical step in those reform efforts, balancing President Trump\u2019s commitment to remaining the world\u2019s most generous nation, with the imperative to bring reform to the way we fund, oversee, and integrate with U.N. humanitarian efforts.\u201d <\/p>\n

At its core, the reform project will help establish pools of funding that can be directed either to specific crises or countries in need. A total of 17 countries will be targeted initially, including Bangladesh, Congo, Haiti, Syria and Ukraine. <\/p>\n

One of the world\u2019s most desperate countries, Afghanistan, is not included, nor are the Palestinian territories, which officials say will be covered by money stemming from Trump\u2019s as-yet-incomplete Gaza peace plan. <\/p>\n

The project, months in the making, stems from Trump\u2019s longtime view that the world body has great promise, but has failed to live up to it, and has \u2014 in his eyes \u2014 drifted too far from its original mandate to save lives while undermining American interests, promoting radical ideologies and encouraging wasteful, unaccountable spending. <\/p>\n

Fletcher praised the deal, saying in a statement, \u201cAt a moment of immense global strain, the United States is demonstrating that it is a humanitarian superpower, offering hope to people who have lost everything.\u201d <\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Lee reported from Washington.<\/p>\n

Jamey Keaten And Matthew Lee, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Critics say the Western aid cutbacks have been shortsighted, driven millions toward hunger, displacement or disease, and harmed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":375448,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-375447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375447","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375447"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375447\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}