EU instruments for emergency response and civil protection assistance during the Covid-19 pandemic – part I
EU instruments for emergency response and civil protection assistance during the Covid-19 pandemic – part I

Summary/Abstract: The Covid-19 pandemic was a global challenge that required globalsolutions. EU Member States, guided by the principles of solidarityand multilateralism, acted together to provide support to various actorsin countering the negative effects of the pandemic. The EU mobilisedresources to support the emergency response. A number of emergencyresponse mechanisms have been mobilised, both within the Union's areaof external action and internally. The main instruments for responding tothe pandemic were EU humanitarian aid and the activities of the EU CivilProtection Mechanism. The aim of the article is to present the process ofproviding assistance to the population using the above-mentioned EUinstruments in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak. The mainresearch problem is: were the EU's instruments of assistance to the popu-lation effective in the face of an emergency such as the Covid-19 pandemic,and in which situations did these instruments have a limited capacity toact? The research methods used in the article are the formal-dogmaticmethod and the theoretical-legal method. The EU civil assistance mecha-nisms in place proved to have insufficient response capacity. The pandemicrelief system has highlighted the limited capacity of the European Unionto respond directly to crises when the actors implementing this assistancethrough the usual mechanisms, show deficiencies, or when their actionsare ineffective or insufficient. Consequently, the European Union, in the midst of a growing epidemic crisis, has introduced a number of changesleading to a more effective delivery of emergency assistance in the face ofthe current pandemic and strengthening the EU's preparedness for futureemergencies.

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