EuropaWorld 8/6/2001 Afghanistan: Former King Urges Aid as Donor Nations Meet in Islamabad

A meeting of major donor nations convenes this week in Islamabad. Its purpose is to assess the humanitarian needs of Afghanistan. The country, which has suffered recently from severe droughts, has also been badly hit by 21 years of war.

Famine is affecting large numbers of people, particularly in the more rural parts of the country. Many villagers have left their homes, either driven out by fighting or because they are starving. The livestock had been killed and there is no money left to buy food. The Afghan economy is in shambles.

Earlier this year United Nations Special Envoy, Kenzo Oshima, help to launch a consolidated appeal to donor nations on behalf of various UN agencies providing relief in the country. This appeal was based on his own investigations into what it would cost to meet humanitarian needs. He estimated this at a quarter of a billion dollars. However only a fraction of these funds have been raised.

Here's the problem. Assessing the need is all very well but it is frequently a delaying tactic to avoid meeting the appeals that have already been made. There is very little hope of the international donor community ever providing sufficient funds to satisfy adequately the ever increasing Afghan humanitarian crisis.

Now the former King of Afghanistan has written to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan to add his voice to those pleading for increased aid to the country. In a recent letter, the exiled former King, Mohammed Zaher Shah, makes an urgent appeal for a further increase and expansion of the humanitarian aid programme to meet the immediate needs of the beleaguered Afghan people living both in their country and in refugee camps in neighbouring states.

The King, who will be 87 this year, reigned for 40 years from 1933 to 1973 when he was deposed in a bloodless coup. During his rule the country was broadly stable and was able to maintain its neutrality. Aid flowed in from both the United States and the Soviet Union.