KUWAIT: Kuwait's Al-Salam humanitarian charity has launched a campaign to assist Yemeni and Syrian internally displaced persons (IDPs) and refugees that will continue until February 11. Speaking to KUNA, charity's chairman Nabil Al-Oun said this year's campaign targets immediately about 2000 camps inside Syria and about 800 others in Yemen, as these areas are suffering a sharp shortage of basic needs in winter.

Of the 8-year campaign goals is to meet the needs of refugees in the camps and the stricken areas in Syria and Yemen, he said, indicating that the new campaign titled "Kuwait Trucks" will reach its goal by covering the needs of refugees there. The campaign includes more than 500 trucks carrying supplies of winter and basic materials including heating and foodstuffs as well as others, he said.

Kuwait-based charity helps fund fledgling enterprises in Africa, Yemen.

Meanwhile, Dhari Al-Buaijan, director general of society, said the society has been backing and empowering the needy all over the world by setting up some sustainable projects. The UN recent statistics on the tragic situation in the above-mentioned areas show the serious current situation on families and individual who are displaced and afflicted by wars and disasters, he stated.

Funding enterprises

Meanwhile, a Kuwait-based charity has given out micro loans to help get nascent enterprises off the ground in Africa and Yemen, touching the lives of some 39,000 people, it said. Impoverished families across swathes of Africa have stood to gain from such initiatives, Kuwait Direct Aid Society chief Dr Abdullah Al-Sumait told KUNA, pointing out that the vast majority of the beneficiaries have been women. Loans given out by the Kuwaiti charity towards such endeavors over the course of the last seven years were worth nearly KD five million ($16 million), he added. - KUNA