Aid exodus fear as medical agency leaves Afghanistan
Thursday July 29 2004
The withdrawal, announced yesterday, two months before landmark elections are due, is the most damning indictment yet of the failure of the Afghan Government, American troops and Nato peacekeepers to bring stability to the country two years after the fall of the Taliban.
The organisation, which has maintained an unbroken presence in Afghanistan for more than two decades, accused the US military of co-opting humanitarian aid efforts for "military and political motives", endangering aid workers by blurring the line between civilian and military operations. The decision comes just weeks after the killing of five Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF) workers in northern Afghanistan by Taliban militants, who accused them of spying for the US.
The announcement is expected to provoke an exodus of other aid organisations.
Fighters from the ousted regime are believed to be behind the killings of more than 20 aid workers this year alone as part of a concerted effort to disrupt reconstruction efforts. MSF said the level of violence against aid workers was unprecedented, even during the worst years of factional fighting in the 90s after the Soviet Union's withdrawal. That fighting sparked the chaos that brought the fundamentalist Taliban regime to power.
"Today's context is rendering independent humanitarian aid for the Afghan people all but impossible," said MSF who added that the government's failure to carry out a "credible investigation" into the killings of its staff had contributed to its decision to leave. (© The Times, London)
- Catherine Philp
