Visitors to the Civil Defence Exhibition at the Qatar National Convention Centre yesterday. (Salim Matramkot)
Doha: The Doha Declaration issued by the 4th Civil Defence Exhibition and Conference has welcomed the proposal of Qatar to establish a mechanism for coordination between civil defence, search and rescue teams in GCC states.
The conference was organised by the General Directorate of Civil Defence of Qatar in collaboration with the Consultative Group on International Search and Rescue and the International Organisation for Civil Protection and Civil Defence and the participation of the United Nations Office of the strategies of international disaster risk reduction.
The declaration stressed the need to strengthen coordination between civil defence and search and rescue teams to respond to crises and disasters.
The conference covered four key issues including coordination in the operations of the civil defence, search, rescue and emergency services, and capacity building for relief workers and humanitarian operations, and dealing with major risks of medical and psychological aspects , and the protection of civil defence personnel in military conflicts.
The Doha Declaration confirmed the continuation of cooperation and coordination between civil defence and civil protection and search and rescue teams based on Oslo Guidelines for civil-military cooperation in the natural disasters of 1994 and its Supplement of 2003 on armed conflicts.
It also stressed the importance of the guidelines of the International Advisory Group for Search and Rescue as an initial reference by the General Assembly at the United Nations No.57/ 150 in 2002 as the basis and reference for the definition of standards for international assistance to search and rescue teams in urban areas.
QNA
