09/19/2001

On Tuesday RI chairman James V. Kimsey and RI president Kenneth H. Bacon wrote Bush administration officials asking them to take account of the humanitarian needs of the Afghan people as the administration plans its necessary response to the terrorist attacks against the United States last week. On Tuesday afternoon, U.S. State Department announced that it was giving the UN High Commissioner for Refugees $2 million to support relief programs for refugees from Afghanistan. The announcement came as Rudd Lubbers, the head of the UN's refugee agency was in Washington urging U.S. officials "to be aware of the already desperate plight of millions of Afghan civilians and the humanitarian consequences to ordinary people while formulating policy options." Here is RI's letter to President Bush:

President George W. Bush
The White House
Washington, DC

Dear Mr. President:

As you plan the military, diplomatic, and economic responses needed to destroy the terrorist network that attacked the United States, it is important that you also prepare to meet the humanitarian needs of the people of Afghanistan, a country that already is the site of the greatest crisis of hunger and displacement in the world.

Twenty-two years of war, three years of drought, and the difficulties caused by the repressive Taliban regime have driven nearly four million Afghans to flee to Iran and Pakistan. According to the United Nations, five million people still in the country are in danger of starvation due to a three-year drought. Hoping to escape a U.S. response to last week's devastation, 100,000 Afghans have fled Kabul and other cities, and the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar is now half-empty.

Many people in rural parts of the country are on famine rations: bitter wild roots and grass mixed with wheat flour to make bread. Tens of thousands of people in the cities, including war widows, the elderly, and orphans are completely dependent upon international aid for their survival. Only food aid—mostly U.S.-donated wheat—stands between them and starvation.

Yet most UN and non-governmental relief agencies have pulled out of Afghanistan following last week's attack against the U.S. The World Food Program says it has only enough food in the country for two weeks of distribution by local personnel. The borders with Pakistan and Iran are mostly closed to the flow of people and goods.

The U.S. experience in the Gulf War suggests the importance of anticipating and minimizing refugee flows and starvation. In the Gulf War, the U.S. was caught by surprise when over two million Kurds fled, some to neighboring Turkey and Iran, to escape Saddam Hussein, necessitating an urgent humanitarian response for which the international community was largely unprepared.

Refugees International recommends that the administration prepare a humanitarian impact analysis for military operations and contingency plans to deal with humanitarian challenges. Military operations should be planned to minimize the impact on people already tottering on the edge of famine and to repair humanitarian damage as soon as possible.

Considering that the war is with terrorists and their supporters, not with the Afghan people, the U.S. also needs to find a way to resume relief operations and food aid to the Afghan people. The first step should be immediate consultations with the UN Secretary General to find ways to enable relief workers to return safely to the country and resume operations. The UN must anticipate huge refugee and humanitarian problems and, as it did in Macedonia this summer, get the people and the resources into the region to deal with them.

The most appalling and universally condemned aspect of last week's attack against the U.S. was the targeting of innocent civilians. The U.S. cannot afford to be accused of doing the same in its response. The U.S. requires the support of moderate Muslims around the world and this necessitates maintaining the moral high ground. A humanitarian disaster in Afghanistan, if attributed to U.S. military operations, could leave the American people even more vulnerable to terrorism in the future. The United States wants to win the war against terrorism—not sow the seeds of future problems.

Refugees International