European Commission to provide 60 million euros to Nepal

Feb 15, 2007, 5:23 GMT

Kathmandu - The European Commission (EC) has agreed to provide 60 million euros (78.43 million dollars) to Nepal in regular development assistance over the next three years, officials said Thursday.

The pledge came during a meeting of the Nepal-EC-Joint Commission in Kathmandu, and the aid, which would be disbursed from 2007 to 2010, would be used for peace building and health programmes.

Nepalese officials said the commission, the executive body of the European Union, had also agreed to review whether the assistance should be increased during the second phase from 2010 to 2013 after an analysis of Nepal's performance.

The 60 million euros does not include assistance that the European Union currently provides through other organizations for human-rights promotion, internal refugees and victims of Nepal's decade-long conflict with Maoist rebels, which ended last year when the Maoists agreed to lay down their arms and join the government.

The visiting seven-member commission delegation was led by its Asia Director James Moran. Under the cooperation agreement reached in 1995, the Nepal-EC Joint Commission meets twice a year in Kathmandu and Brussels.

The commission and EU member states are among Nepal's biggest aid donors.