Help begins arriving in quake-stricken Afghanistan

In this story:

• Trucks, aircraft bring food, supplies
• Journalists outnumber doctors, aid workers
• Taliban neither helping nor hampering relief effort
• 'People are living in the snow'

February 12, 1998
Web posted at: 9:52 p.m. EST (0252 GMT)

RUSTAQ, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Help finally began arriving in a remote region of northern Afghanistan Thursday where as many as 30,000 people were left homeless and shivering in snow and cold last week by a major earthquake.

Assistance for the remote region has been virtually non-existent since the earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale struck on February 4, leveling 28 mountain villages and killing at least 4,500 people. Thousands more are still missing.

But a three-truck convoy finally made it to the area Thursday, bringing 20 tons of food to Rustaq where a school has been turned into a refugee center for about 1,200 people.

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Two U.N. planes carrying nearly two tons of food, blankets and plastic sheeting were also able to land later in the day, and two Red Cross aircraft made it to the area -- the first flights since Monday.

Nevertheless, the Rome-based World Food Program (WFP) said 30,000 people in the province of Takhar are still in "desperate need" of shelter, blankets and food.

"This aid must come tomorrow or the day after at the latest," said Jarle Thorghersen, who works for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in Rustaq.

Journalists outnumber doctors, aid workers

The United Nations and the International Red Cross appealed Thursday for $2.5 million, primarily to pay for building materials to shelter shivering survivors whose only protection from the cold and snow is the clothes they are wearing and plastic sheets.

Women clutching infants wrapped in ice-caked blankets begged rescue workers for help.

"We can't mess around here. If we don't get that shelter, people will die," said Sarah Russell, spokeswoman for the United Nations in neighboring Pakistan. "We need this money absolutely as soon as possible."

Journalists outnumbered doctors and aid workers in the region Thursday -- a fact that embittered quake survivors and the local leaders trying to care for them.

"What is the matter? Why are so few people coming to our aid?" said Abdullah, a spokesman for the alliance that controls the area. Like many Afghans, he uses only one name.

Aid agencies faced a logistical nightmare in trying to supply the region, which has been plagued by snowstorms, fog, bitter cold and war-shattered roads. The relief effort has been complicated by landslides, harsh terrain and the long distances between villages in need of help.

Taliban neither helping nor hampering relief effort

The effects of almost 20 years of civil war further hampered rescue efforts. Impenetrable front lines cross shattered highways where the northern military alliance that controls the earthquake zone faces the Taliban Islamic army along a 40-mile front southwest of Rustaq.

While the Taliban has not been stopping aid convoys, the religious army that controls 85 percent of the country has not given any assistance to the quake victims, either.

The only helicopter to reach Rustaq Thursday carried Uzbek warlord Rashid Dostum, a leader in the military alliance that controls the area. Dostum brought with him a seven bales of money worth about $50,000, but there is nothing to buy in Rustaq.

When it was unloaded, the inhabitants of this devastated town looked on in disbelief. Aid workers watched in disgust as cameramen for Dostum's faction filmed the money's arrival.

"It's just political," said one aid worker. "This will do nothing."

Many of the worst-hit villages are in an area that is more mountainous than Rustaq, and getting aid to them is a logistical nightmare. Melting snow has turned frozen roads into muddy quagmires.

'People are living in the snow'

Mohammed Karim said he trekked with several neighbors for days from their stricken village, hoping to return with supplies on their backs and on donkeys for others who were unable to leave.

His feet were wrapped in tattered wool rags as he shivered under a thin wool blanket.

"Our houses have collapsed. People are living in the snow. What are we supposed to do?" he said. "They are dying and no one is helping us."

Khadaynazar Pirmat, 35, and his wife and several donkeys left their village of Kazyr, which was destroyed in the quake, and headed for Rustaq. The couple's six children were all killed in the disaster.

"We're dying of cold," he told Reuters Television. "We have to leave."

A Hercules C-130 transport plane from Kabul was expected to make an air drop Friday, and a second convoy of 50 tons of food and non-food items was expected to reach the affected area Sunday.

Two helicopters from Tajikistan are also expected to arrive with supplies.

Reporter Marina Fazel and Reuters contributed to this report.

Message board:

• Afghanistan: Reeling from earthquake devastation

Related stories:

• New tremor levels Afghan villages as aid trickles in - February 10, 1998
• Afghan aftershock sends villagers fleeing - February 9, 1998
• Aftershocks add to death toll, hinder aid to Afghanistan - February 8, 1998
• Thousands reported killed in Afghanistan quake - February 6, 1998

Related sites:

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• DisasterRelief.org
• International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
• United Nations Home Page
• U.S. Geological Survey
• Worldwide information on earthquakes
• Seismology Resources on the Internet
• Global Earthquake Response Center
• Afghanistan Online

External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.

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