Tracking Number: 209559
Title: "US Pledges Humanitarian Aid for Iraqi Needy." The US has pledged 36 million dollars to a UN relief plan to help needy groups in Iraq who are suffering because of the
Iraqi government's refusal to comply with UN resolutions permitting export of oil to purchase food and medicine. (920114)
Translated Title: Nouvelle aide de E-U aux personnnes deplacees en Irak. (920114)
Author: NEWMANN, ROBIN (USIA STAFF WRITER)
Date: 19920114
Text:
*POL202
01/14/92 HU.S. PLEDGES HUMANITARIAN AID FOR IRAQI NEEDY SH(Iraq refuses to comply with U.N. plan) (470) BYBy Robin Newmann BIUSIA European Correspondent
TGeneva -- The United States has pledged $36 million to a United Nations relief plan to help needy groups in Iraq who are suffering because of the Iraqi government's refusal to comply with U.N. resolutions permitting export of oil to purchase food and medicine.
The U.S. contribution was announced during a meeting in Geneva January 13, of donors and international humanitarian relief organizations involved in the U.N. inter-agency humanitarian program on Iraq and the region.
The U.N. program began last year at the end of the Persian Gulf war and the Iraqi government crackdown on thousands of Kurds who fled to the north of the country and who are still suffering from supply restrictions implemented by the Iraqi military.
The plan of action presented to the 20 donor countries calls for supplying during the first six months of this year $145.3 million in essential food for displaced populations and vulnerable groups in Iraq and for refugees in neighboring Iran, and to pay for other parts of the U.N. operation in Iraq, from winter shelter and essential water and sanitation services to support for 500 U.N. guards in Iraq.
Michael Stopford, spokesman for Henrik Olesen, the executive delegate of the U.N. secretary general who is coordinating humanitarian operations in the gulf region, called the U.S. pledge "extremely positive and welcome."
U.S. delegate Frances Culpepper told the meeting that Iraq's intransigence was causing "suffering" in the country.
"We cannot ignore the plight of vulnerable groups in Iraq, particularly those in the north who are deprived of the normal distribution of supplies," Culpepper said. "That is why we are supporting the appeal."
The U.S. contribution will be used in particular for food (some $13 million), and shelter and relief of the Kurdish population ($15 million), with the remaining $8 million to be allocated in consultation with the executive delegate.
Olesen added that the appeal was targeting Iraq's "most essential needs." And even if Iraq decided to sell oil, he said, the U.N. program would still need funding for the transition period -- about two months -- between the time the decision to export oil was made and the revenue collected worked its way through to relief supplies.
Under U.N. Security Council Resolutions 706 and 712, adopted last year, Iraq is allowed to export up to $1,600 million worth of oil as a one-time exception to U.N. sanctions against Iraq in order to purchase food, medicines and other humanitarian supplies, and to pay for compensation to those hurt by Iraq's ill-fated occupation of Kuwait. NNNN
File Identification: 01/14/92, PO-202; 01/14/92, EP-209; 01/14/92, EU-207; 01/14/92, NE-212; 01/15/92, AE-304; 01/16/92, AF-407; 01/15/92, NA-304; 01/15/92, AE-304
Product Name: Wireless File
Product
Code: WF
Languages: French; Arabic
Keywords: IRAQ-US RELATIONS; HUMANITARIAN AID; IRAQ/Economic & Social; PETROLEUM EXPORTATION; SANCTIONS; PERSIAN GULF WAR; KURDS; DISPLACED PERSONS
Thematic Codes: 1NE; 3AI
Target Areas: EA; EU; NE; AF
PDQ Text Link: 209559; 209940
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