On the heels of a two-day visit to the Central African Republic (CAR), U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Assistant Administrator for Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Assistance Nancy Lindborg announced today in Brussels that the United States is providing nearly $30 million in additional U.S. humanitarian assistance to address urgent needs resulting from the crisis in CAR, for a total commitment of nearly $45 million in humanitarian assistance since increased hositilities in December.

This funding will provide critical food assistance, medical care, and relief supplies to those affected by recent violence and internally displaced as well as those who have fled as refugees to neighboring countries. It will also assist stranded migrants with basic assistance and transportation to their home countries through the International Organization for Migration. This assistance comes in addition to $24 million in U.S. humanitarian assistance to help the vulnerable last fiscal year. The United States remains committed to closely coordinating with the international humanitarian community to meet urgent needs.

Through the UN’s World Food Program, $10 million of the new funds will supply nearly 5,500 tons of vital, regionally purchased food commodities—rice, beans and nutritional supplements—to feed 1.25 million food-insecure people through August 2014. With the peak hunger season expected in May, the nutritious foods provided in this food basket will help prevent malnutrition among more than 315,000 internally displaced and food insecure people throughout the country.

Amidst a cycle of indiscriminate killings, rape, and displacement in a country with a collapsed health system, this new funding will also support emergency health care to treat the wounded and provide primary health care services to mitigate endemic diseases like malaria. It will alsostrengthen rapid response mechanisms thereby allowing humanitarian organizations to meet needs as they are identified and to address critical humanitarian protection needs among the internally displaced and other vulnerable populations. Additional funding to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees will provide protection and humanitarian assistance to some 86,400 CAR refugees who have fled to neighboring countries since January 2013.

With relief efforts hampered by violence and limited infrastructure, new U.S. assistance will support vital coordination, security, and logistical operations to help ensure urgent assistance reaches those most in need.

Assistant Administrator Lindborg announced this additional funding at a High-level International Meeting on Humanitarian Action in the Central African Republic in Brussels. She traveled to Brussels immediately following a two-day visit to CAR, where she visited both Bangui and Bossangoa, and met with religious, civil society, human rights, media, and women leaders, along with the United Nations and international and local humanitarian partners. “One fifth of Bangui is now living in a vast, miserable encampment as terrified citizens seek safety from violence and looting. The U.S. government has urgently ramped up our assistance to help deliver lifesaving food, water, and medical help to the more than 2.6 million women, children, and men in urgent need throughout the country.”

United States humanitarian assistance for CAR comes in addition to $101 million in support for restoring security in the country and nearly $7.5 million to support conflict mitigation, reconciliation and peacebuilding, including interreligious peacebuilding efforts through USAID’s Complex Crises Fund and Human Rights Grants Program, announced on December 19.

The United States remains grateful for the important contributions made by the African Union, regional states, and France, and is committed to supporting their efforts. We will continue working actively to help end the violence.

For more information about the U.S. response to crisis in the Central African Republic, please visit http://www.usaid.gov/crisis/central-african-republic and contact USAID.