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CNN LIVE EVENT/SPECIAL

America Strikes Back: Afghanistan Refugee Crisis is Actually a Food Crisis

Aired October 17, 2001 - 05:42   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: The United Nations Security Council has begun meetings with the U.N. Diplomat for Afghanistan, and for now, the talks are focusing on the refugee crisis and the urgent need for countries to make good on their promises of aid.

CNN's Rebecca MacKinnon reports first-hand from a refugee camp in Pashawar, Pakistan.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REBECCA MACKINNON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Monthly rations for the new Shamshatu refugee camp. In order to get his or her share, each person must be registered and certified as a refugee.

People like 35-year-old farmer, Hiya Talab (ph), with four kids, his wife and his mother to feed. He brought them here last year because war and drought left them with nothing.

"Everybody is tired of Osama bin Laden," he says. "People want him out. They are afraid of war."

There are many war widows here. Gulalay Maray (ph) says her husband, a schoolteacher, died fighting the Northern Alliance. She says the Taliban forced him and other teachers to fight. Now, she is destitute.

(on camera): The World Food Program is already feeding about one million Afghan refugees outside Afghanistan, plus about four million people inside Afghanistan. By the end of the winter, they expect to be feeding about seven-and-a-half million Afghans.

(voice-over): Most of them will remain inside Afghanistan, but getting the food to those people who desperately need it has become more difficult since the airstrikes began. These trucks were supposed to be departing in a convoy for Afghanistan, but for safety reasons, they could not leave.

Pakistan's border with Afghanistan has remained closed to refugees since September 11. While some sneak across, aid workers say they're not declaring themselves to authorities as refugees, and therefore, not getting food at camps like this.

: The people of Afghanistan have put up with 22 years of war. They have been listening to various broadcasts within the country that's told them that the borders are closed. There is no refugee crisis right now. There is a food crisis.

MACKINNON: Rebecca MacKinnon, CNN, Pashawar, Pakistan.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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