WCK responds to refugee crisis in Armenia

 

Thousands of refugees seek safety in Armenia WCK's Relief Team is on the ground in Armenia working alongside several partners to support refugees who have fled Nagorno-Karabakh after it was seized by Azerbaijan earlier this month. Our team first arrived in Yerevan, Armenia's capital, where we immediately began working alongside Chef Aline Kamakian who was already on the ground coordinating relief efforts. Aline is a writer and Lebanese-Armenian culinary ambassador who we've previously worked alongside in Lebanon. After the 2020 explosion in the Port of Beirut that devastated the city, Aline and her team helped us provide thousands of meals to families impacted by the blast.  Watch as WCK's Melissa reports from Goris where thousands of refugees are entering Armenia. Within hours of arriving, our team began preparing hot meals and sandwiches in Yerevan with the support of local restaurants and volunteers from the Armenian General Benevolent Union. We transported plates of chicken with bell peppers and potato and salami and cheese sandwiches to Goris, a town near the border with Nagorno-Karabakh through which thousands of families are traveling as they flee hostilities in the enclave. Chef Aline, left, plans out the day's menu with kitchen staff in Yerevan. Now, to provide meals as quickly as possible, we have partnered with a hotel in Goris where we have already been cooking dishes like lentils and buckwheat, cabbage, and carrot salad and stewed red beans with fresh herbs. Alongside hot meals, we are serving freshly prepared lavash. WCK teams have identified another border crossing where thousands of people may be in need of food and we are actively assessing how we can best support them. This is a quickly evolving situation, and WCK is committed to adapting our response as needs shift.  More than 700,000 meals served in Morocco since devastating quake Since the early September earthquake struck Morocco, World Central Kitchen has served more than 700,000 meals by cooking from two Field Kitchens and working alongside dozens of restaurant, catering, and NGO partners.    Within a week of the earthquake, we had built and started cooking out of a Field Kitchen in the city of Asni. However, our community outreach teams were finding need not only in the Al Haouz Province, where Asni is located, but also in the Taroudant Province to the south. Traveling this distance takes four, sometimes six hours along winding mountain roads. To solve this problem, we established a second kitchen in the city of Oulad Berhil, 80 miles southwest of Asni, where the meals made can reach communities in the Taroudant Province quicker. Watch as our team builds out our Oulad Berhil Field Kitchen. While we continue to deliver thousands of meals daily to impacted communities across the Atlas Mountains, we are also gathering feedback from villages on what aid they need.   “Winter is coming and families are anxious to prepare,” Zomi, WCK’s response lead in Morocco, emphasized. “We want to make sure we build resilience in their communities for cooking long after we’re gone. Especially for villages above the snow lines.”  With that in mind, WCK has been providing cooking equipment and food kits along with hot meals, so that villages will once again be able to cook for themselves. Learn more about our efforts in Morocco here. You can help us keep cooking for families in need by donating here. As with every response, the local community is helping guide our work, and awing our teams with their grace, kindness, and grit. “Food is love. Food is energy. Food is to live,” said Asmaâ, who began working as a volunteer and has since become a crucial part of our community outreach team. She and all of the locals who are helping us are essential to WCK’s work. Erin, WCK CEO, put it succinctly: “The local volunteers and local contractors and local chefs are truly invaluable…this work is made possible because of Moroccans feeding Morocco.” SUPPORT OUR WORK