March 22
— By David Brough
ROME (Reuters) - The United Nations food aid agency scrambled on
Saturday to move food to warehouses near the border with Iraq to
prepare for the possible arrival of thousands of refugees fleeing
the U.S.-led invasion.
The collapse of the U.N.-backed oil-for-food program after the
United Nations ordered its international staff to leave Iraq on
Monday has denied fresh food supplies to 60 percent of the country's
25 million people.
"We are continuing our preparations, and we may have to assist
about two million Iraqis in an initial phase," Trevor Rowe, chief
spokesman of the U.N. World Food Program (WFP), the world's biggest
food aid agency, told Reuters.
In Jordan, the WFP was erecting a portable warehouse at
Al-Ruwayshid near the border with Iraq on Saturday, Rowe said.
He said it would store up to 400 tonnes of food and added that
around five tonnes of high-energy biscuits were already there, ready
for handing out by the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR.
In Syria, WFP has stockpiled basic food rations to feed 20,000
potential refugees or for delivery to Iraq, Rowe said.
In Kuwait, the agency was procuring bread that could be used to
feed some 200,000 people over 10 days.
In Turkey, WFP planned to send some 50 tonnes of high-energy
biscuits to Silope in the southeast over the next few days.
Up to half a million Iraqis fled cities in the northern Kurdish
areas ahead of the invasion, moving their families to outlying
villages, aid agencies said on Saturday.
The city of Dohuk near Turkey is "almost depopulated," and people
have also poured out of the key oil hub of Kirkuk, the U.N. Office
of the Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq said.
The U.N. estimated there were 350,000 to 450,000 internally
displaced persons (IDPs) in the north, and movements continued.
In Amman, WFP officials said food deliveries in Iraq would begin
as soon as it was safe for staff to work in the country.
"It's too early to make a judgment. We believe people have enough
food to sustain them until the end of April," spokesman Khaled
Mansour said.
Rowe said he was not aware of imminent plans to move food aid
into Iraq via the southern port of Umm-Qasr, where U.S. marines
still faced pockets of resistance on Saturday, a day after
Washington said it had won control.
British military leaders said aid would start moving into Iraq
through Umm Qasr as soon as mine-sweeping was completed.
As well as WFP, the United States and Australia were preparing
aid shipments.
Washington has said it would release 600,000 tonnes of U.S. wheat
from state grain reserves for the Iraqi relief effort.
The U.S. Agriculture Department said this week that 200,000
tonnes of grain would be sent immediately.
Australia, traditionally Iraq's major wheat supplier, is also
shipping wheat. On Friday, the government committed 100,000 tonnes
of wheat through its AusAid program.
(Additional reporting by Suleiman al-Khalidi in Amman)
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