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Friday,
March 28, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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Food aid a drop in ocean
Bush, Blair discuss war
24 US troops reported killed |
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Civilian deaths worry UN
Pervez condemns massacre Hizbul outfit splits
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Food aid a drop in ocean Safwan (Southern Iraq),
March 27 The convoy, loaded with 45,000 boxes of food, was mobbed by the hungry Iraqis who are reeling under economic sanctions of 12 years and a tyrannical rule of President Saddam Hussein. Men and children jostled with each other to get custody of a box and by the time the relief trucks were emptied of their cargo it was clear that the food just distributed was only a drop in the ocean, or more appropriately a grain of sand in the desert. International aid agencies have warned of an unprecedented humanitarian crisis that is waiting to happen in Iraq and the United Nations has recognised the need for mounting relief operations immediately. Then what is stopping the aid-givers to go ahead with their relief operation in Iraq? The reason is that a relief mission which genuinely meets the needs with supplies has to be necessarily in terms of shipments because even scores of food-laden trucks would just not be enough. But the coalition forces very recently discovered to their horror that their ships cannot dock in the Umm Qasr harbour. At least not for now. And at least three wheat-laden ships, one British and two Australian, were waiting for green signal to enter Umm Qasr, the port city captured by the coalition forces earlier this week. Now the question arises why the relief supplies are being shipped to southern Iraq through Umm Qasr? That is because the Iraqis have mined the shipping channels leading to Umm Qasr, Iraq’s only deep-water port of immense strategic significance. Yesterday only two mines were discovered by the British mine-sweepers. The mines, detonated later, were capable of sinking any ship. The UN had started oil-for-food programme for Iraq in 1996 after seeing the deteriorating plight of the common Iraqis. Under the programme, Iraq was allowed to sell as much quantities of oil as it wished to for buying food and medicine. But because of the war, Iraq’s food stocks have plummeted and the godowns have virtually emptied. The World Food Programme may temporarily take over the Iraqi Government’s food-rationing system, started since 1996 with the oil-for-food programme for feeding nearly 60 per cent of the 22-million Iraqi population. |
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Bush, Blair discuss war Washington, March 27 At the top of the allied leaders’ agenda was the military campaign on the ground and humanitarian relief efforts, along with post-war reconstruction and the UN role in it. The two men enjoyed what was billed as a very small social dinner yesterday night at the rustic retreat in Maryland’s Catoctin Mountains, about 60 miles from the White House. Mr Blair left for London saying that he also wanted to confer with Mr Bush on how to mend European-American divisions after the bitter UN Security Council debate over Iraq. The rift already has bled into discussions over how to deliver aid to Iraqis and who should oversee the creation of a new Iraqi government once the fighting stops. Senior US official said Mr Bush “certainly will be ready to talk about” relations between the USA and Europe, despite lingering resentment in Washington over the role of France, Germany and others in blocking a second Security Council resolution seeking a UN mandate for war on Iraq. The US Secretary of State, Mr Colin Powell, said yesterday that Washington would not cede control of Iraq to the UN if and when it overthrows President Saddam Hussein. “We didn’t take on this huge burden with our coalition partners not to be able to have a significant dominating control over how it unfolds in the future,” Mr Powell told a House of Representatives subcommittee.
Reuters |
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24 US troops reported killed Washington, March 27 The Pentagon said seven US soldiers were officially listed as prisoners of war, and 10 were listed as missing. As of late yesterday, 28 Americans had been wounded, it said. Of the 24 Americans killed in the war on Iraq, 19 died in combat, while five died in accidents or other non-hostile situations, officials said. Britain lists 22 soldiers as dead or missing. Defence officials had previously said up to 12 soldiers of the 507th Ordnance Maintenance Company were captured or killed by Iraqi forces after their unit made a wrong turn during a battle near Nassiriya in southern Iraq.
Reuters |
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Civilian deaths worry UN United Nations, March 27 “The civilian population of Iraq has no part in this conflict and must be protected from its consequences at all costs.... Attacks on civilian installations are a serious breach of humanitarian international laws,” UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq, Ramiro Lopes da Silva, said. Lopes da Silva’s office said the emergency room at Abougreb Hospital in Baghdad was full, and Premiere Urgence, a French NGO with 60 staff in the city, was extending it by erecting tents for overflow of patients.
PTI |
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Annan admits damage to UN over Iraq crisis United Nations, March 27 In the last few months, Mr Annan said, people of the world have shown how much they expected from the United Nations and the 15-member Security Council. “Many of them have been bitterly disappointed,’’ Mr Annan told a Security Council debate on Iraq, the first since the US-led war began a week ago. “All of us must regret that our intense efforts to achieve a peaceful solution through this council did not succeed,’’ he said. ‘’We are living through a moment of deep divisions, which, if not healed, can have grave consequences for the international system and relations between states.’’ He said faith in the United Nations could only be restored if the Council worked on specific goals for Iraq, including tapping into billions of dollars in Iraqi oil revenue to finance the emergency aid under the UN oil-for-food programme, which is still stalled in the council. Mr Annan, however, criticised both Iraq for neglecting arms inspectors and the USA for acting unilaterally. After bitter divisions over the war, Council members have been meeting for several days to restart the oil-for-food programme, aimed at granting Mr Annan a new mandate to coordinate the delivery of supplies to Iraq as soon as possible. The aim is to adopt a resolution tomorrow that would authorise Mr Annan to set new priorities for the UN programme.
Reuters |
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Pervez condemns massacre Islamabad, March 27 “It seems clear that this dastardly act has been perpetrated by elements who wished to create friction and do not want an improvement in Indo-Pak relations,” he said in a statement here last night. General Musharraf urged the Indian leadership to “carefully investigate and analyse” the “cowardly and heinous act of terrorism” to determine the identity of the elements that were involved “and get to their real motive, rather than levelling allegations.” “Such acts which have been taking place from time to time are not in any conceivable way in Pakistan’s interest. This fact must be realised and understood by the Indian leadership,” he said.
PTI |
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Hizbul outfit splits
Islamabad, March 27 Two hundred supporters of Dar parted ways with the Salahuddin-led faction and launched their own faction. “We have launched our own faction of Hizb-ul Mujahideen,” Tufail Ahmed, a former operational chief of the Hizb-ul and supporter of Dar, was quoted as saying by Pakistani daily Dawn here today. “Around 40 per cent of the Hizb activists are with us,” Ahmed said. Ahmed’s remarks came as some 200 emotionally-charged youth chanted slogans: “Dar we salute your greatness” and “Dar you have become immortal” in Muzaffarabad yesterday. Some youths also carried portraits of Dar, who was regarded as a moderate militant. “We had no option but to part ways with the Salahuddin-led faction of the Hizb, but we will carry on the struggle for freedom from India,” Mr Ahmed said. He said commanders of the group had unanimously appointed Ahmed Yasin as chief commander, “who will use his full abilities to fill the vacuum” created due to Dar’s killing. Militants shot dead Dar, former Hizb-ul Mujahideen chief commander who shot into prominence after announcing a unilateral ceasefire in 2000, at his house at Noorbagh in Baramulla district of North Kashmir on March 23. “Our struggle at the militant front will continue till achieving the goal, in consultation with the All Party Hurriyat Conference and those Kashmiris who are working abroad at the diplomatic front,” Mr Ahmed said.
PTI |
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