US threat over N Korean food aid

[__Kratos__]

The US says it will stop giving food aid to North Korea unless it lets international relief workers monitor its distribution.

The US said it wanted to check aid - channelled through the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) - reached the needy.

The statement comes as the WFP prepares to halt food aid to North Korea after Pyongyang said it was no longer needed.

US-N Korean relations have been deteriorating since September talks on ending the North's nuclear ambitions.

North Korea has relied on foreign aid to feed millions of people since acknowledging a serious famine in the mid-1990s.

But it now says better harvests at home and aid supplies from China and South Korea have rendered the aid distributed by the UN redundant.

Instead, Pyongyang has said it wants more foreign help with long-term development projects.

'Policy of starvation'

The US is one of the biggest donors to the WFP, which has overseen the distribution of food aid in North Korea.

In June, it promised 50,000 tonnes of food aid would be delivered - though the WFP - after saying that better monitoring on the part of the WFP and more cooperation on the part of North Korea had reduced the chance of aid being diverted

But now US State Department Spokesman Adam Ereli has warned the aid might be the last.

Mr Ereli said more aid had been earmarked for North Korea but would not be released until Pyongyang allowed its distribution to be better monitored.

"Until and unless we can be sure that the food we give is really going to the people who need it, then we can't continue to provide aid," he said.

But, he said, criteria for monitoring were not being met.

Mr Ereli accused Pyongyang of ignoring the needs of its people and letting them starve for "inexplicable reasons".

By the end of 2005, the WFP will have wound down a programme that, at its peak, was feeding some 6.5 million North Koreans.

The UN food agency says the famine is now over but some 37% of North Korean children remain chronically malnourished, according to a survey it conducted in 2004.

Talks on what form the WFP's presence in North Korea may take in the future ended earlier this month, with the agency saying it hoped to eventually re-instate parts of its programme.

Source

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Perhaps N. Korea should cut back on it's military instead? I'd rather know where the food was going then giving them 50,000 tons of food only for it to feed their military instead of the starving children.

[Super Pancake]

b*******

We need to get this peace treaty thing going on in N.Korea damn how long has the cease fire been like 50 years now!

[Fluffybunny]

The statement comes as the WFP prepares to halt food aid to North Korea after Pyongyang said it was no longer needed.

No longer needed?

There are some seriously sick and twisted individuals in charge there. Unfortunately the leadership has such total control over the population(I.e. "Do what we say or you will starve to death"), that there will never ba able to be any change from the inside of the country. It will take a great deal of work from the countries in the local area to make that happen...As it seems that China couldn't care less and no one else has the resources to be able to take the leadership down, I think it is going to take quite some time to make any changes there... Or an all out nuclear war...either way...

[I am me]

We shouldn't be giving food to that country or any country to begin with. We are probably one of the reasons the regime there has not completely fallen apart yet.

[XNavyGunner]

Why are we giving these people food? They are raised to hate us. By feeding them, we're feeding a potential army fighting against us. Use the food for pewople here at home and quit worrying about everyone else.

[kjmk]

A cup of our corn in one hand and a nuke in the other. Yeah...that makes sense.

[Lord Umbarger]

Sending food and other aid to North Korea is like feeding the dog that will bite us. I too hate to see people starving to death in the streets but, what are the options?

N. Korea takes the supplies the U.N. gives them and uses it to control the people and feed its army, not it's people anyway. All we are doing when we give them food is feed their military. They are strong enough as it is.