Today, I am in Mosul, Iraq. An iconic city throughout the multiple crises that afflicted the country in its recent history. Frantic reconstruction is taking place; but for the inhabitants of this city of two million before IS, it is not fast enough.

Many houses bear the pockmarks of gun fire, or carry still the black soothy shroud of the blazes caused by one warring group or another. It is easy to admire the many new houses and buildings going up, until you realise that in exactly those places, the old ones were totally destroyed.
We have been launching two EU MADAD programmes: one carried out by the UN agencies UNDP and UN Habitat, and a complementary one by a consortium of smaller agencies from EU member states led by VNG International: Maintaining Strength and Resilience for Local Governements (MASAR)

These programmes are about spatial planning, reconstruction, municipal services and jobs in both the Kurdistan Region of Iraq and Iraq under federal control. We are honoured to be part of the efforts to turn cities and towns into good places to live again.

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