Red Cross seeks direct aid supply to North Korea<\/p>\n
SEOUL (Agencies): Red Cross officials in South Korea yesterday
\nsought talks to speed up food aid to North Korea as diplomats
\nfrom the United States and the two Koreas prepared to meet again
\nover landmark peace talks.<\/p>\n
Kang Young-hoon, president of the South Korean Red Cross,
\nproposed to his Northern counterpart that Red Cross officials
\nhold talks for the \"speedy and smooth\" delivery of food and other
\nrelief materials.<\/p>\n
A South Korean Red Cross statement said Kang made the proposal
\nin a message delivered via a \"hot line\" linking the two
\norganizations.<\/p>\n
It came only hours before the United States and the two Koreas
\nwere to resume discussions in New York aimed at winning
\nPyongyang's unqualified agreement to join peace talks with its
\narch-rival, Seoul.<\/p>\n
In a similar meeting on Wednesday, delegates from the three
\ncountries held an inconclusive meeting, but all sides reported
\nprogress and said they hoped to settle the issue yesterday.<\/p>\n
The meeting was called to hear Pyongyang's formal response to
\na year-old U.S.-South Korean proposal for four-party peace talks,
\nin which China would also participate.<\/p>\n
North Korean representatives essentially told U.S. and South
\nKorean diplomats they accepted the peace talks proposal, but then
\ntied that acceptance to a new demand for international assistance
\nto meet severe food shortages, U.S. officials said.<\/p>\n
But Seoul and Washington officials said they thought Pyongyang
\nwould eventually accept the peace talks, which are to work out a
\nlasting peace on the Korean peninsula to replace the truce
\nagreement that ended the 1950-53 Korean War.<\/p>\n
\"North Korea is desperate for food now. It can't afford
\nwalking away from the question of peace talks and delay relief
\nsupplies,\" said Kim Hak-joon, former presidential policy adviser
\nin Seoul and now the dean of the University of Inchon.<\/p>\n
In Seoul, Kang yesterday called for a Red Cross meeting as
\nsoon as possible in Panmunjom, the only border-crossing point
\nalong the Demilitarized Zone bisecting the peninsula.<\/p>\n
The South Korean Red Cross has made 14 relief shipments since
\nNovember 1995 to North Korea, including US$1 million worth of
\npotatoes and vegetable seed this month.<\/p>\n
South Korean religious and other civic groups have pledged to
\nraise $20 million over the next two months to buy 110,000 tons of
\ncorn. All private aid shipments must be channeled through the Red
\nCross.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile in Geneva, a spokeswoman for the World Food Program
\n(WFP) said here yesterday that North Korea is on the brink of
\nfamine with food stocks set to run out at the end of the month.<\/p>\n
\"We are really on the edge of famine. The government said
\nrecently that there would be enough until summer, but now the
\nauthorities are saying that there will be nothing left at the end
\nof the month,\" spokeswoman Christiane Berthiaume told a press
\nbriefing.<\/p>\n
Conditions in the non-agricultural north of the country were
\nparticularly severe, she said, adding that starving North Koreans
\nwere forced to eat tree bark which brought on intestinal
\nbleeding.<\/p>\n
The WFP, which launched an appeal on April 2 for $95.5 million
\nhas so far received $34 million.<\/p>\n
\"That's a fast response but given the urgency of the
\nsituation, not fast enough. We need money as quickly as possible
\nif we are to avert a catastrophe,\" she said.<\/p>\n
Food rations are at near starvation levels, with government
\nhanding out 100 grams per day to individuals, compared to 450
\ngrams per day before the outbreak of the food crisis, sparked by
\nsevere flooding over the past two years and collapse of the
\ncountry's economy.<\/p>\n
The WFP aims to distribute 60,000 tons of food in May,
\nBerthiaume said, reminding that the funds appeal was for 203,600
\ntons of food for 4.7 million people, including small children.<\/p>\n
A first U.S. ship, the Galveston Bay, is due to arrive in
\nNorth Korea around May 3 or 4 carrying 13,500 tons of corn and
\nsoya-corn.<\/p>\n
A second U.S. shipment of 6,600 tons of rice and 8,600 tons of
\ncorn and soya-corn is planned for around May 20, she said.<\/p>\n
The WFP is buying 26,000 tons of rice regionally and 660 tons
\nof vegetable seeds with $8.4 million donated by the European
\nCommission.<\/p>",
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