The United States will provide $150 million (about 231.7 billion won) in emergency humanitarian aid to Venezuela, which suffered massive casualties from a powerful earthquake.
The State Department said on the 25th (local time) that President Donald Trump immediately approved financial support and search-and-rescue operations to respond to the urgent needs of the Venezuelan people right after the earthquake.
The total aid amounts to $150 million. Of that, $50 million will be disbursed through international relief groups operating on the ground, including World Vision, Samaritan's Purse, Catholic Relief Services (CRS), International Medical Corps (IMC), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), and the World Food Program (WFP). The remaining $100 million is set to go to the Venezuela pooled fund run by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
The United States is also expanding on-site rescue operations. The State Department said it will dispatch two urban search-and-rescue (USAR) teams specializing in locating and rescuing survivors to Venezuela. The teams are from the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department in Virginia and the Los Angeles County Fire Department in California, and consist of firefighters, emergency medical personnel, rescue engineering engineers, and specialists who handle search dogs. They also carried out rescue operations in Jamaica in Oct. last year after Hurricane "Melissa."
The State Department also said it has formed a separate task force (TF) for disaster response and, in coordination with the Ministry of National Defense, is helping ensure that response personnel, equipment, and humanitarian supplies move quickly to the affected areas.