18 October 2001

Taliban Loots, Attacks Relief Organizations in Afghanistan

Washington -- United Nations relief agencies and humanitarian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are reporting attacks upon their staffs and facilities in Afghanistan.

These organizations charge that Taliban soldiers and other armed groups are the perpetrators of these assaults, which serve to undermine the effort to help a population of an estimated 5 to 7 million Afghans who could face starvation in the coming winter.

The World Food Program (WFP) reported the Taliban seizure of two of its warehouses October 16, with the apparent loss of some 7,000 tons of grain intended for distribution to the needy. October 18, the WFP regained control of one overtaken warehouse and the 5,300 tons of supplies stored inside the Kabul facility. In a WFP statement issued from New York, the United Nations' primary agency in the fight against hunger called upon the Taliban to also return control of the second warehouse located in Kandahar and the more than 1,600 tons of grain stockpiled there.

Speaking to reporters hours after learning of the seizure October 17, WFP Executive Director Catherine Bertini said the mission to provide food for the Afghan population will continue regardless of the increasing security risks. "We hope that the Taliban will respect the need of their people to eat," Bertini said.

The United States supplies about 80 percent of the food aid going into Afghanistan. WFP aims to transport 900 tons of grain into the Central Asian nation each day, Bertini said.

An office operated by the International Organization for Migration in Mazar-e-Sharif (IOM) was ransacked on October 15. In a Vienna press briefing the next day, spokesperson Jean Philippe Chauzy said, "Equipment and vehicles were stolen. Two local IOM staff were robbed and beaten." Reports on the incident were described as sketchy and the identity of the looters was unclear.

Earlier in October, the Taliban was identified as the culprit in an attack on the headquarters of the U.N. Coordinator for Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA). Armed Taliban solders entered the UNOCHA compound, looting communications equipment and vandalizing vehicles.

In response to this aggression against its humanitarian campaign, the U.N. Security Council, meeting in New York October 16, "demanded that the Taliban should stop threatening the safety and security of aid workers, and to cease obstructing aid destined for the Afghan people," according to Council President Ambassador Richard Ryan of Ireland.

In an October 18 press release issued from its New York office, the NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported attacks on facilities and staff occurring at a variety of private NGOs involved in Afghan relief. HRW Asia Director Sidney Jones said, "The Taliban and other armed elements are carrying out widespread attacks on humanitarian workers in Afghanistan, and stealing their equipment, supplies and vehicles. These assaults directly affect the ability of humanitarian agencies to provide relief to a desperate civilian population."

NGOs involved in demining activities describe several incidents in which Taliban militiamen have seized trucks, ambulances and other vehicles used by the organizations in their work, according to the HRW news release.

In another incident cited by HRW, a second demining NGO reported that armed men stormed the office, beat the guards, looted the office equipment and stole vehicles.

Some humanitarian NGOs have cited the U.S. bombing campaign of Afghanistan as an impediment to conducting their relief work. Responding to that suggestion in an October 17 briefing, Rear Admiral John D. Stufflebeem of the Joint Staff said, "There is nothing we're doing that should prevent the nongovernmental organizations from doing what they need to do. But I have seen reports that the Taliban is preventing them from doing what they should be doing. We're supporting all efforts."

The Department of Defense has acknowledged that a U.S. bombing mission did strike a Red Cross warehouse storing relief supplies that was within a set of targets identified as Taliban military storage facilities. Admiral Stufflebeem said that the campaign continues to support the relief mission. We delivered approximately 53,000 humanitarian daily rations (HDRs)," Stufflebeem said. "To date, we've had nearly 400,000 HDRs dropped."