Humanitarian aid reaches Dili by road
JAKARTA (JP): A convoy of trucks loaded with humanitarian aid provided by the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) arrived in refugee camps outside East Timor's capital of Dili on Thursday from Atambua in East Nusa Tenggara.
Aris Boedihardjo, Unicef communications officer, told The Jakarta Post the food convoy reached the hills in Dare without incident.
Thousands of starving people have been sheltering in Dare, some 15 kilometers south of Dili, since violence first ravaged the half-island territory earlier this month.
"We got through the border area safely and went on to Dili this morning without much trouble," Aris said, adding that the convoy was escorted by Indonesian Military (TNI) troops between Liquica and Dili.
The aid, the first to be delivered by road, included 1.2 tons of baby food, medical supplies, tents, blankets and clean water.
"We plan to carry out regular delivery operations by land to augment humanitarian airdrops conducted by other international organizations," Aris said.
To help the mission, Unicef has opened offices in Atambua and Darwin in Australia, according to Aris. The organization's office in Dili will soon resume activities.
A UN flight carrying thousands of high-protein biscuit packs to refugees hiding in the hills of East Timor did not make its drop on Thursday because the pilot was unsure about the coordinates. UN humanitarian coordinators Abdul Mejid Hussein and Julien Lefevre described the problem as "a mapping issue".
"The drop wasn't identified exactly and they felt uneasy about dropping without being sure of the exact site," Lefevre said as quoted by AFP in Darwin.
Aid officials are facing a race against time to get food and medical treatment to refugees before the monsoon season begins next month.
There are 6,000 tons of rice in the UN's Dili warehouse, enough to feed 500,000 people for one month, according to the UN.
Hussein said secure roads and sea passage were needed quickly because the onset of the monsoon in October/November would stop airdrops from continuing.
Meanwhile, some 4,000 East Timor refugees arrived in Wini Port in East Nusa Tenggara from Liquica. One of the refugees, Domingos dos Santos, told the Post that many more people were stranded in Liquica due to a lack of ferries plying between the town and East Nusa Tenggara.
"People prefer to leave their homeland due to the worsening security situation," dos Santos said. He added that with the absence of buses and trucks, sea transportation had become the only choice by to flee East Timor.
Wini has become the destination of refugees streaming from Liquica and Oekusi, the capital of the East Timor enclave of Ambeno.
East Timor refugees who have sought shelter in the neighboring province of East Nusa Tenggara exceeded 205,000 as of Thursday.
Ministry of Health secretary-general E. Sutarto said that poor sanitation in refugee camps across the province had become the government's main concern. He said, however, there had been no signs of a certain epidemic diseases.
Quoting reports from local administration staff, Sutarto said medical supplies would be enough for the next seven months. The drugs were provided by the government under a presidential instruction program, donations from Japan and Australia, as well as the provincial budget.
The ministry has also launched a vaccination program for refugees.
He said the ministry would send 25 reinforcement doctors to Atambua Hospital, while South Sulawesi and Bali have pledged to dispatch 11 and 20 doctors respectively to East Nusa Tenggara.
Apart from medical staff and drugs, the ministry has sent 15 ambulances, which also can serve as mobile community health centers, to East Nusa Tenggara. The mobile health centers will provide service within 24 hours.
With the wet season approaching, the ministry will step up measures to prevent the spread of dengue fever. Sutarto said the province was prone to the disease. (05/06/27)