The first meeting of the International Assistance Working group was held in Tunis on 17-18 January, under the auspices of the EU Delegation to Tunisia. The creation of this working group was proposed by the implementing consortium of the EU-funded IPCAM2 project (Increasing Preparedness Capacities Across Mediterranean 2).

The Working group’s coordination is assigned to the Tunisian National Office of Civil Protection who is at the same time the partner and the beneficiary of IPCAM2. It is expected to develop and propose national operational procedures to formulate an international assistance request in the framework of the European Mechanism of Civil Protection, the reception of international teams, their deployment and the follow-up of operations (Support of host country). To support the working group, the Department of the Italian Civil Protection, leader of the consortium, has sent two experts in the field of the European Mechanism and the Support of the host country.

The first day was devoted to the creation of the Group, the presentation of the initiatives that were already undertaken in this field, the lessons learned from the forest fire emergencies last summer 2017 and the identification of the aspects and the national procedures to develop in the framework of an international assistance request in case of forest fire.

In the second day, the technicians set the priorities to face and the detailed working programme in order to elaborate operational procedures for each involved institution and at the interinstitutional level.

One of the objectives of IPCAM2 is to support the development of measures to prepare to disaster management by the Tunisian Civil Protection through a stronger international cooperation. 75% of its total budget of 600,000 euros is provided by the European Union. It started in January 2017 and will last 24 months. The project is implemented by a consortium led by the Italian Civil Protection Department (DPC) and which includes the Tunisian Civil Protection National Office (ONPC), the German Agency for Technical Rescue (THW) and the German Federal Bureau for Civil Protection and Assistance in case of Disaster (BBK).

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Press release

EU Delegation to Tunisia