Reuters
November 6
he UN humanitarian agency UNICEF hopes to start aid deliveries to northern Afghanistan by river from neighboring Uzbekistan in the next week or so, a UNICEF official said yesterday.
Delivery of humanitarian aid has become a key issue, with the US military operations in Afghanistan and the onset of winter, which is expected to leave many people trapped in mountainous regions.
''In a week, or maybe 10 days' time, we hope to make the first delivery by barge to Afghanistan. We are working towards that at the moment,'' said a UNICEF official based in the Uzbek capital here.
Last month, the Uzbek government said it would allow the United Nations to use the southern Termez river port to move aid to Afghanistan for the first time since 1998.
Uzbek Foreign Minister Abdulaziz Kamilov said last week that humanitarian aid arriving in Termez would be duly shipped to Afghanistan by barge, but that a number of ''technical questions'' were being discussed with the United Nations.
The Uzbek government has also agreed to open Termez airport to aid agencies to allow them to stockpile humanitarian cargo.
UNICEF has already moved three humanitarian shipments destined for Afghanistan to warehouses in Termez. Two arrived by road after being flown into Tashkent and the third was flown directly to Termez from Copenhagen last week.
The UNICEF official said a fourth aid flight to Termez was due on Thursday. Last week's delivery, she said, was the first international flight to land in the airport for four years.
She said the aid included high-protein biscuits, water containers, boots, jackets, and blankets.
Once UNICEF gets the go-ahead to deliver the shipments, the official said, supplies would be loaded onto trucks and rolled down to the barges. They would then be shipped across the Amu Darya river and handed over to UNICEF on the Afghan side.
Aid officials said the opening of the Termez port would be particularly helpful, because it can handle large volumes and could become a major supply route.
Uzbekistan has repeatedly said that for security reasons it will not open its border bridge to allow aid into Afghanistan.