AID-U.S: CIA sees more humanitarian disasters in 1995

• by IPS Correspondents (washington)
• Saturday, December 17, 1994
• Inter Press Service

WASHINGTON, Dic 17 (IPS) - The U.S. intelligence community sees 1995 as a year of worsening humanitarian disasters, especially in Africa and West Asia, according to a report in Saturday's Washington Post.

Some 40 million people could die of malnutrition, disease and civil strife in these regions unless they receive emergency aid and other help from the international community, according to the article which was based on a classified U.S. national intelligence estimate.

Especially at risk are people in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Sudan, and the central African region consisting of Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, and northeast Zaire, according to the report. Four million or more people could die of major humanitarian disasters in each of these areas next year.

The underlying document, a draft summary of a report prepared by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, the Pentagon's Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA), and other U.S. spy agencies, was approved last week by the National Intelligence Council for distribution to top policymakers, according to the Post.

It comes at a time when many aid supporters here are expressing great concern over the incoming Republican-dominated Congress. Many Republican leaders are openly skeptical about the value of U.S. aid programmes and oppose U.S. involvement in peacekeeping and humanitarian operations abroad.

Congressional control over the President Bill Clinton's pursestrings threatens his administration's ability to respond to major humanitarian disasters, such as that which persuaded former President George Bush to dispatch U.S. troops to Somalia two years ago.

Indeed, the timing and circumstances of Saturday's report suggests that it may have been leaked by administration forces who are eager to build the case now for why aid should not be cut.

Last week, Agency for International Development (USAID) chief Brian Atwood made a series of public appearances in which he warned that Republican isolationists were wrong to think that Washington could somehow erect a wall against chaos and disaster abroad.

The new intelligence estimate warns that, like the United States, other western countries may also be increasingly reluctant to respond to such disasters, according to the Post account.

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