Blair calls for 'humanitarian coalition' to tackle Afghan refugee crisis
( 2001-09-28 11:01 ) (7 )

The international community must build a "humanitarian coalition" to deal with the waves of refugees fleeing Afghanistan, Prime Minister Tony Blair said on Thursday.

Throwing his support behind similar calls by top United Nations officials, Blair said a concerted aid campaign must be included in efforts to neutralize terrorists residing in the Central Asian nation.

"Just as we have built a political and military coalition following the events in America, now we have also to build a humanitarian coalition to deal with humanitarian crisis in that region," he told reporters at his Downing Street office.

Britain's international development secretary, Clare Short, later announced that Britain would provide Pakistan with an additional 11 million pounds (US$16.2 million) in aid for Afghan refugees.

The aid package -- which is to focus on the hard-hit North West Frontier Province and Balochistan -- brings the total amount given to Pakistan since the atrocities to 36 million pounds (US$52.9 million).

Once again taking a central role in coalition-building in the wake of the September 11 attacks in the United States, the prime minister said he would soon discuss the refugee crisis with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and the European Union external affairs commissioner, Chris Patten.

"I will be stressing throughout the importance of a massive assistance program going hand in hand with diplomatic and military options," he said.

Hundreds of thousands of desperately poor Afghans have been massing on the country's borders in fear of expected US reprisal strikes.

The UN's World Food Program is already providing food for some 117,000 Afghan refugees in Pakistan and for 35,500 in Iran, who had fled the hardships of years of war and drought.

Security fears and lack of transport forced the WFP to stop shipping food into Afghanistan two weeks ago, but the UN agency has been using existing food stocks in the country to help feed up to 1 million people inside Afghanistan.

Short told a meeting of Blair's Cabinet late on Thursday that one in four Afghans were dependent of outside aid, the prime minister's official spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity.

With international aid workers no longer in Afghanistan, plans to get food into the country were being discussed "as a matter of urgency," Short was quoted as saying.