Military

ATE=04/19/02

TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT

TITLE= U-N AID/ PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES

NUMBER=2-288908

BYLINE=DALE GAVLAK

DATELINE=GENEVA

INTERNET=YES

CONTENT=

VOICED AT:

INTRO: United Nations agencies are distributing food

and medical aid to the devastated Jenin refugee camp

and are trying to reach other areas in the Palestinian

territories. Dale Gavlak has the story from the U-N's

humanitarian base in Geneva.

TEXT: The U-N agency aiding Palestinian refugees,

UNRWA, (pron. un-rah) says it is providing food,

medicine and water to those left homeless in the Jenin

camp, which was ravaged by fighting between

Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen.

UNRWA spokesman Rene Aquarone says the agency has set

up tents outside the Jenin camp to temporarily house

residents because many shelters have either been

destroyed or are unstable. He says UNRWA is

distributing supplies raised by Palestinian

communities living in Jerusalem and Israel.

///AQUARONE ACT///

We are now using all these supplies, food, also tents

and blankets to access the refugees. We have managed

to do a considerable distribution. The center of the

camp has been obliterated. In some parts, the rubble

is three-stories high.

///END ACT///

Mr. Aquarone says UNRWA is responsible for

coordinating relief efforts for the Jenin camp. He

says offers for sending specialized personnel to

search for victims buried by the rubble have been

pouring in from Norway, Switzerland, France, Turkey

and the United States. The Swiss-based International Committee

for the Red Cross has set up tracing services for

missing people.

Requests to Israel to provide heavy equipment to

remove the concrete wreckage have so far gone unanswered.

Israeli authorities also prevented the West Bank coordinator

for the World Health Organization from entering the Jenin

camp on Thursday and was only allowed to enter the hospital

on the outskirts of the town.

Mr. Aquarone says UNRWA is concerned about being able

to reach Palestinians with aid in Bethlehem, Nablus,

and Ramallah because curfews are keeping people shut

up in their homes. The World Food Program says it has

managed today (Friday) to distribute 40 tons of food

to Palestinians in hospitals and other institutions in

these West Bank towns. It also has delivered 10 tons

of food aid to Jenin.

Fadela Chaib of the W-H-O says her organization

has not been able to reach Palestinians in

these areas with medical supplies and this is

worrying.

///CHAIB ACT///

People who need uninterrupted treatment, for example

for heart diseases, diabetes, etc. They do not have

easy access to health facilities so there is a risk

for them to die if they don't get this treatment in

time.

///END ACT///

W-H-O has sent 50 emergency health kits expected to

arrive on Tuesday, that include surgical and medical

aids to care for more than 300-thousand people. It also

expressed fears that epidemic outbreaks of diarrheal

diseases, meningitis and measles could take place in

the West Bank because of the lack of clean water,

sanitation and vaccines. Electricity cuts, it says,

may have destroyed the stocks of vaccines that do it

exist.

The International Committee of the Red Cross says it

has visited 13-hundred Palestinians detained by Israel

during the fighting in Jenin. It says it welcomes an

international inquiry into what took place in refugee

camp, but lacks the expertise to lead such a probe.

(Signed)

NEB/DG/SAB