Food, water, medicines and medical staff are in short supply across the country. A diarrhoea outbreak in Basra has prompted fears that dysentery and dehydration-related deaths will follow. Reports that limited amounts of aid are reaching areas occupied by coalition forces, ignore the plight of millions still living in disputed areas.

Save the Children New Zealand’s Executive Director, John Bowis, said today: “Under the Geneva Convention, it is the responsibility of the coalition forces now in control of most of Iraq to protect the civilian population and ensure that their basic humanitarian needs are met. They are failing to achieve this for most of the people in areas of the country now under their control."

“Before the war, the UN ran its biggest food distribution scheme around the globe in Iraq - feeding 23 million people solely reliant on outside aid. This system must be reinstated urgently.

“The need is so great in Iraq after 3 wars and 12 years of sanctions that only a massive humanitarian effort will avert a full-scale crisis. Save the Children is well placed to deliver urgent aid."

Save the Children is calling on the coalition to take 3 urgent steps:

To restore law and order in areas under their control, reassembling existing local police forces and guaranteeing their pay and rations for the first month
To guarantee specific security protection from looting and theft for all hospitals, water and power facilities, and to reassemble existing medical and engineering teams in those facilities, guaranteeing their pay and rations for the first month
To create security conditions in which humanitarian agencies can bring in essential supplies and expertise to support local people in distributing aid, without direct military control
Save the Children has worked in Iraq since 1991. Throughout the war, 60 national staff have been distributing blankets, clothes and fuel to displaced families in the north. Over the next few days, Save the Children will begin distributing water and cooking fuel to residents of the port city of Um Qasr, where security remains a serious concern.

Mr Bowis says that the biggest challenge for Save the Children is not bringing water and cooking fuel to the Iraqis, but distributing it in a safe and equitable manner.

“Recent attempts to distribute food and water by the military and other relief groups have been met with overwhelming crowds that have disrupted distribution, and in some cases, forced groups to pull out."

ENDS
Save the Children New Zealand is running an emergency appeal for the children of Iraq. Call 0800 167 168 to make your donation, or donate online here

For more information, contact Save the Children 04 385 6847 or info@scnz.org.nz