Accidentally, one more time
Ivo Skoric
ivo at reporters.net
Sat Oct 27 22:15:19 CEST 2001
How many times do you thing Pentagon is able to bomb Red
Cross warehouses in Kabul accidentally? So far, they admited to
have done it twice. Would anybody bet that it can happen a third
time? Or maybe even a fourth?
Meanwhile, the aid agencies like Oxfam, ICRC and MSF are
asking the US to stop dropping food on Afghanistan. They are fine
with the US amateurish dispensing of its expensive ordnance over
the vast Afghan mountainous dessert, with occassional children
assassinating blunder, but would like that US, please, leave the aid
delivery to professionals.
And the USA Patriot act is in force now. The law on the books is
nothing without the implementation. So we should see how worse
did the US become in terms of its liberties in the course of
implementation of that act.
Abroad, sadly, everybody took an opportunity to join in the global
misbehavior. Macedonians vs. Albanian minority. Israelis vs.
Palestinians. Russians vs. Chechens. Chinese vs. Uighurs. US,
indeed, takes pains to declare that not all Muslims are terrorists,
but in the other parts of the world such thinking is regarded as the
expensive luxury and best avoided.
ivo
Date sent: Sat, 27 Oct 2001 02:42:16 -0400
Send reply to: International Justice Watch Discussion List
<JUSTWATCH-L at LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Tomasevich <danilo at MARTNET.COM>
Subject: Agencies call on U.S. to end food drops
To: JUSTWATCH-L at LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU
Humanitarian agencies that distribute food in Afghanistan say
the food drops are making things worse. They could deliver food
much cheaper by land.
Daniel
(article not for cross posting)
-------------------------------------------------------------
The Ottawa Citizen October 26, 2001 Friday
Agencies call on U.S. to end food drops
BY: Kate Jaimet
Humanitarian workers are being put in danger by the American policy of
air-dropping food into Afghanistan, field workers for Oxfam, the
International Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders said yesterday.
"Our staff are in danger. If one side of the conflict perceives that
the other is using humanitarian aid as a weapon of war, we could be
perceived as the enemy and therefore our staff could be targeted,"
said Mark Fried, communications and advocacy co-ordinator for Oxfam
Canada.
"We're quite concerned that this blurring of the line between
humanitarian and military is dangerous to our staff on the ground and
ultimately dangerous to the whole effort of providing humanitarian
relief."
Meanwhile, Lai Ling Lee, program director for Doctors Without Borders,
bluntly called on the Americans to stop the food drops.
In an attempt to show that its bombing campaign is aimed at
terrorists, not at Afghani civilians, the United States has dropped
more than 700,000 packages of single-serving food rations that include
vegetarian entrees and rice-based nutrition bars.
But Mr. Fried said the rations are reaching only one per cent of the
people in need. He characterized the price of the rations as
"obscene," saying that it cost $27 million to distribute 130,000 meals
by air -- about $207 per meal -- while Oxfam could distribute roughly
the same amount of food by land for less than 3.5 cents a meal.
Attempts by aid groups to distribute food by land have almost ceased
in Afghanistan, as the U.S. refuses to pause its bombing and the
Taliban refuses to provide protection to aid workers threatened by
thieves, looters and pillaging soldiers. Seven million people are said
to be at risk of starvation inside Afghanistan.
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