Press Releases

Afghan Women’s Mission to U.S. Government: Halt Bombing Immediately

October 24, 2001

Hundreds of thousands will starve if not helped by mid-November

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT
Voice: 626-676-7884
E-mail: info_at_afghanwomensmission.org

The Afghan Women’s Mission calls upon the government of the United States to immediately suspend military air strikes on Afghanistan in order to allow convoys to deliver food and medicines to millions of Afghans before winter sets in.

“Hundreds of thousands of Afghans are on the verge of starving to death. We cannot look the other way,” said Sonali Kolhatkar, Vice President of Afghan Women’s Mission.

The Mission joins Oxfam International, Islamic Relief, and other international relief agencies in warning of the potentially catastrophic consequences of the bombing if humanitarian deliveries continue to be cut back.

In an October 23 statement, the president of the United Nations Security Council emphasized the “importance of ensuring that emergency supplies are delivered to Afghans in need as quickly as possible.” The Afghan Women’s Mission welcomes the UN’s demand on the Taliban to “stop preventing aid from reaching the Afghan people and stop threatening the safety and security of aid workers,” but this is not enough, because aid deliveries are also threatened by air strikes. The safe distribution of materials and administration of medicines to the vulnerable Afghan people requires an end to the bombing campaign.

Over 4 million Afghans depend on international aid to survive. In addition to over two decades of continuous war, the Afghan people are experiencing a three-year drought, the worst in over three decades. Oxfam estimates that even before the tragic events of September 11, 5.5 million Afghans were “already at risk of severe food shortages.” After September 11, the threat of a US attack on Afghanistan caused aid agencies to withdraw their international staff from the country. The already fragile infrastructure of aid distribution has begun to break down, and hundreds of thousands of Afghans teeter on the brink of starvation with borders on all sides of the country virtually shut down.

After the bombing began on October 7, any remaining aid convoys were curtailed dramatically, since “truck drivers are…unwilling to take to the roads to deliver goods…because of fear of US-led bombing or attacks by one or another of the factions,” said Refugees International. This has been exacerbated, according to Oxfam, by the breakdown of law and order in some parts of the country where NGOs and the UN operate.

“The missile strikes make our job harder to do,” said Stephanie Bunker of the United Nations, mentioning a “six week race against winter,” after which it will be extremely difficult to get aid into the country. According to UNICEF, “as many as 100,000 more children will die…this winter unless food reaches them…in the next six weeks.” Two million people do not have enough food to last the winter, and 500,000 of them will be unreachable after snow begins to fall in mid November.

“It is evident now that we cannot, in reasonable safety, get food to hungry Afghan people,” said Oxfam director Barbara Stocking.

More information about the plight of Afghan refugees is also available on the Afghan Women’s Mission website, https://www.afghanwomensmission.org, and the RAWA website, http://www.rawa.org.