Race against time for Afghan aid

It is difficult to reach those who have fled their homes

Eighteen aid agencies have called on governments to help them get food and medical help into Afghanistan before a freezing winter sets in.

Meeting in Islamabad, agencies including Oxfam, CARE and Save the Children, urged world leaders not to allow politics to get in the way of averting a humanitarian crisis in a country where an estimated six million people are dependent on food aid.

Others must make the political decision necessary for us to do our work, and avert a disaster for the innocent of Afghanistan

Joint statement

The United States, which has pledged an extra $320m in aid to help the Afghans, is considering plans to airdrop supplies, but is concerned aircraft would be vulnerable to attack by the Taleban.

The agencies reported that at present a "negligible" amount of food is entering Afghanistan, estimated to be little more than 15% of what the country's food needs had been prior to the attacks on the US.

Winter looms

Agencies have said it is increasingly difficult to make relief deliveries to those in need because so many people in the country have fled their homes in fear of US attacks.

They warn that winter will take hold in the inhospitable country within the next six to seven weeks, when temperatures may drop as low as -25C, dramatically increasing human suffering.

The US must decide how to distribute $320 in aid

"We call upon the US and its allies, the United Nations, the Taleban and the Northern Alliance, to formally recognise the need for an independent, non-political humanitarian action of massive proportion," they said in a statement.

"Others must make the political decisions necessary for us to do our work, and avert a disaster for the innocent of Afghanistan."

Fighter escort

A Pentagon spokesman said airdrops of relief supplies would be a "particularly dangerous undertaking" and that transport planes would need to fly with a fighter escort.

"You'd have to be smart in your planning," Admiral Craig Quigley was as saying by the Associated Press news agency. "We know that the Taleban have anti-air capabilities."

The main threat could come from Soviet-era missiles or the Stinger hand-held missiles originally supplied to Afghan fighters by the United States.

US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said the Pentagon would be careful to plan an airdrop that would succeed.

Mr Rumsfeld, who is shuttling around the Middle East and Central Asia to shore up support for the coalition, said it was vital not to let rations fall into the wrong hands.

Terrorists not civilians

In a speech to US State Department workers in Washington, President George W Bush said the people of America had no compassion for terrorists, nor for any state that sponsored them.

But he added: "We have great compassion, however, for the millions around the world who are victims of repressive governments.

"While we firmly and strongly oppose the Taleban regime, we are friends with the Afghan people."

Correspondents say that the aid pledges will enable the Bush administration to bolster this kind of assertion, which it has been at pains to stress since its started considering action.

According to some officials in Washington, military strikes are not likely to be targeted against the civilian infrastructure of Afghanistan.