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This is an archived USAID document retained on this web site as a matter of public record.
Remarks by J. Brian Atwood
Dover, Delaware
Administrator, U.S. Agency for International Development
April 9, 1999
Thank you, Senator Biden. Mrs. Clinton, Governor Carper, Congressman Castle, General McDuffie, Colonel Greider, ladies and gentlemen. It is a great honor to be here today and to chair the President's Kosovo Humanitarian Relief Council. Other members of the council here with us today are: General McDuffie, (James Lee Witt, the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency) and Julia Taft, Assistant Secretary for Population, Refugees and Migration at the State Department.
It is essential to the success of this relief operation that the military and civilian agencies work closely together. I have seen in many parts of the world, including recently in Central America, in the aftermath of Hurricane Mitch, how invaluable our armed forces are in dealing with humanitarian disasters, whether they are caused by the forces of nature, as in the case of Mitch, or by the cruelty of man, as is the case in Kosovo. Americans can take pride that our government is providing leadership in meeting this great humanitarian challenge.
The shipment that is leaving here today is part of a massive relief operation that is providing food, shelter, medical care and other necessities to the refugees, and in some cases is finding them temporary homes in other countries until they can return to their own homes.
Let me say a word about why the work you are doing here today and the work we are doing in Albania, Macedonia and Montenegro is so important.
The refugees that have come from Kosovo are in very bad shape, both physically and psychologically. They are damp and cold. Many are suffering from respiratory or diarrheal diseases. Thirty-five have died in our care. And they are traumatized by the brutality they have experienced.
The head of USAID's Disaster Relief Team in Albania - a veteran of 30 years - told me yesterday he has never seen such traumatized people. They have watched family members summarily executed. They have stood by helplessly as their homes have been burned to the ground. They have been herded onto trains, stripped of all personal identification and deported from their country. These people desperately need the food and medicine you are sending them. They also need counseling. They need our understanding. They need our prayers.
Thank you for the role you are playing. Thank you for reflecting our nation's strong humanitarian values. When this war is over and these refugees are able to return home, they will be grateful for the work of the U.S. military, for the relief efforts of USAID, for the aid they have received from our State Department's Bureau of Refugee Affairs, and from our Federal Emergency Management Agency. They will remember the American volunteer workers of the non-governmental community. But, most of all, they will be grateful to America and its humanitarian spirit. Thank you.
This is an archived USAID document retained on this web site as a matter of public record.
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Last Updated on: July 12, 2001 |
