MoD Information

Humanitarian Aid is Limited

Thu, April 03, 2003

Source: Ananova News

Allied aid officials have denied they are facing a humanitarian crisis

Allied aid officials have denied they are facing a humanitarian crisis. This is despite admitting their efforts are still largely limited to the southern port of Umm Qasr.

The UN estimates most Iraqis have enough food to last until the end of April but the war could go well beyond that.

Michael Marx, team leader for the USAID Disaster Assistance Response Team, said: "Umm Qasr is effectively the limit of our remit but we have been successful in getting an assessment by the military further north.

"We are pre-positioning food and as soon as the security situation stabilises, we can move north quickly.

"To undertake a national food distribution effort is really going to take the efforts of the UN."

He said safety and security was a concern, but each organisation had to make its own decision about that.

A huge wheat shipment from Australia is expected soon in Kuwait, where it will be picked up by the World Food Programme and trucked into Iraq. A second Australian wheat shipment is waiting off Amman.

Some 500,000 tonnes of wheat is also in the process of being shipped from the US.