Crimson and Clover
03-28-2003, 08:58 PM
By Kate Holton LONDON (Reuters)
- Relief agencies have accused British and U.S. forces of being more
concerned with food aid as a propaganda tool than feeding hungry
Iraqis.
Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) like Save the Children said
chaotic scenes shown on televisions on Wednesday, in which Iraqis
scrambled for food thrown from a truck at Safwan near the border with
Kuwait, was an example of how the provision of aid has become just
another tactic in the U.S.-led war against Iraq. "What they are doing
is not humanitarian aid but a 'hearts and mind' operation and that is
quite different," Save the Children's Director of Emergencies Lewis
Sida told Reuters on Friday. He said humanitarian missions would seek
to avoid such high profile incidents, saying it illustrated that the
military did not have the competence to do aid work and said such
operations did not serve the best interests of the people most in
need.
Wednesday's pictures of young men fighting it out with each other to
grab meagre supplies off the backs of trucks also raised concerns at
Care International UK over the plight of those not strong enough to
do battle for food. "Inevitably the people who need that assistance
most are least able to physically collect it," Care's emergencies
advisor Adrian Denyer told Reuters. "The most vulnerable and the
weakest, the women and children, are a long way from that truck and
it will be the young men who grab the aid and will most likely sell
it rather than distribute it."
Another concern is the amount of food aid that can get through to a
country where 60 percent of the population had been relying on an oil-
for-food programme, which was suspended when the U.S.-led war against
Iraq began.
The first ship to bring humanitarian aid since the start of the U.S.-
led invasion was British ship Sir Galahad, which docked at the port
of Umm Qasr on Friday. But its cargo is a drop in the sea of aid which the oil-for-food programme had provided. "To put it in context,
we have been waiting for the Sir Galahad for days with its 200 tons
of food. Under the oil for food programme ... 16,000 tons a day were
supplied, so you are looking at 80 Sir Galahads a day just to restore
the normal supply," Christian Aid spokesman John Davison told
Reuters. He said aid agencies and the military have had many
discussions over several years about how best to distribute aid.
The agencies said their experience has taught them that the
distribution of food and supplies must be held at secure warehouses
if those most in need can hope to be fed. Almost all aid agencies
have said southern Iraq is still too dangerous for civilian relief
teams, but they are demanding the U.N. take control of humanitarian
work when the fighting ends.
They say they refuse to work alongside the military because being
seen alongside troops would put their own workers in danger and erode
the confidence of the Iraqi people in them. On Wednesday, another
convoy of Kuwait Red Crescent trucks heading for Safwan was
surrounded by Iraqis fighting for the food packages inside.
The troops accompanying the convoy ordered the aid released for
safety reasons. "The fact that it was chaotic and badly planned and
off the back of a truck illustrates that they (military) do not have
the competence to do that," Sida said.
A British defence source told Reuters that the military should not
accept blame for Wednesday's chaos and said aid agencies should plan
the distribution. "Ships are standing by all over the world to bring
aid in but we must be sure we can effectively distribute it. It needs
some planning -- but that's for the aid agencies," said the source on
condition of anonymity.
- Relief agencies have accused British and U.S. forces of being more
concerned with food aid as a propaganda tool than feeding hungry
Iraqis.
Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) like Save the Children said
chaotic scenes shown on televisions on Wednesday, in which Iraqis
scrambled for food thrown from a truck at Safwan near the border with
Kuwait, was an example of how the provision of aid has become just
another tactic in the U.S.-led war against Iraq. "What they are doing
is not humanitarian aid but a 'hearts and mind' operation and that is
quite different," Save the Children's Director of Emergencies Lewis
Sida told Reuters on Friday. He said humanitarian missions would seek
to avoid such high profile incidents, saying it illustrated that the
military did not have the competence to do aid work and said such
operations did not serve the best interests of the people most in
need.
Wednesday's pictures of young men fighting it out with each other to
grab meagre supplies off the backs of trucks also raised concerns at
Care International UK over the plight of those not strong enough to
do battle for food. "Inevitably the people who need that assistance
most are least able to physically collect it," Care's emergencies
advisor Adrian Denyer told Reuters. "The most vulnerable and the
weakest, the women and children, are a long way from that truck and
it will be the young men who grab the aid and will most likely sell
it rather than distribute it."
Another concern is the amount of food aid that can get through to a
country where 60 percent of the population had been relying on an oil-
for-food programme, which was suspended when the U.S.-led war against
Iraq began.
The first ship to bring humanitarian aid since the start of the U.S.-
led invasion was British ship Sir Galahad, which docked at the port
of Umm Qasr on Friday. But its cargo is a drop in the sea of aid which the oil-for-food programme had provided. "To put it in context,
we have been waiting for the Sir Galahad for days with its 200 tons
of food. Under the oil for food programme ... 16,000 tons a day were
supplied, so you are looking at 80 Sir Galahads a day just to restore
the normal supply," Christian Aid spokesman John Davison told
Reuters. He said aid agencies and the military have had many
discussions over several years about how best to distribute aid.
The agencies said their experience has taught them that the
distribution of food and supplies must be held at secure warehouses
if those most in need can hope to be fed. Almost all aid agencies
have said southern Iraq is still too dangerous for civilian relief
teams, but they are demanding the U.N. take control of humanitarian
work when the fighting ends.
They say they refuse to work alongside the military because being
seen alongside troops would put their own workers in danger and erode
the confidence of the Iraqi people in them. On Wednesday, another
convoy of Kuwait Red Crescent trucks heading for Safwan was
surrounded by Iraqis fighting for the food packages inside.
The troops accompanying the convoy ordered the aid released for
safety reasons. "The fact that it was chaotic and badly planned and
off the back of a truck illustrates that they (military) do not have
the competence to do that," Sida said.
A British defence source told Reuters that the military should not
accept blame for Wednesday's chaos and said aid agencies should plan
the distribution. "Ships are standing by all over the world to bring
aid in but we must be sure we can effectively distribute it. It needs
some planning -- but that's for the aid agencies," said the source on
condition of anonymity.