Switzerland has allocated 500,000 Swiss francs (about $507,000) to prepare residents in eastern Ukraine for the winter season, Swiss Ambassador to Ukraine and Moldova Guillaume Scheurer has said.

"We urged the participating states engaged in alleviating the humanitarian consequences of the conflict, and we decided as well to give a special new contribution for the UNICEF winterization program. There are some special needs in winter, and all agencies are coming with their special appeals, Switzerland responded with CHF 500,000 to this appeal in favor of UNICEF winterization efforts," he said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine.

According to the diplomat, many people, including those living along the contact line and those living on both sides of the contact line, are directly affected by the conflict, as well as at least 1.5 million people inside the country.

The ambassador also said that Switzerland plans to keep assistance to Ukraine at the level of previous years.

"We will not diminish our aid, but keep it at the same level or maybe even increase it a little bit. This is precisely the moment when the consequences of the conflict are still active, and donors participating from other states need to continue showing solidarity with the population... The conflict is still a humanitarian tragedy, and I think it is important for all of us to do everything we can together with the Ukrainian authorities, of course, to reduce the suffering of the people," Scheurer said.

At the same time, he noted that the appeals of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and UN agencies do not receive due response from international donors.

"What have we done in 2017? It's roughly what you can achieve in Ukraine in the field of humanitarian assistance with not too much money. The Swiss donation is a little bit more than CHF 3 million a year, but divided into several main objectives. One of them is water," the ambassador said.

Scheurer also said that Switzerland had helped provide access to drinking water for about 3.9 million people on both sides of the contact line.

"What we delivered concretely was a little bit less than 2,000 tonnes of chemicals for water treatments, because water has to be purified to be drinkable," the diplomat said.