LEADALL: Aid shipments in high gear as mourning continues in Haiti

Port-au-Prince - The Port-au-Prince airport was pulsing with US Navy helicopters in a non-stop airlift of food and other aid across earthquake-stricken Haiti as international officials started considering how best to rebuild the flattened capital. A funeral was being held Saturday for Haiti's Archbishop Joseph Serge Miot, who was killed in the January 12 quake. The service will be held in the plaza outside the destroyed cathedral of Port-au-Prince, which had been one of the country's most beloved landmarks.

In Geneva, Margareta Wahlstrom, United Nations special envoy for reducing disaster-related risk, said the world must "rebuild a safer Haiti." Tent cities were being planned to house the homeless until a permanent solution can be found.

More than 30 governments and hundreds of international aid organizations were pulling together to resuscitate the traumatized Caribbean country, where up to 200,000 people may have died.

Ten days on, survivors struggled to balance still-rattled nerves while trying to rebuild their lives, even as they struggle day-to-day struggle for the essentials to survive.

Amid the ruins, dignitaries were bound for Miot's funeral. The 63- year-old Miot was found dead among the ruins of the archdiocese's office in Port-au-Prince.

New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, who is also chairman of the board of Catholic Relief Services, will attend on behalf of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Rajiv Shah, head of the US government's aid agency USAID, was scheduled to arrive Saturday on his second post-quake visit to Haiti, where he was to attend the Miot funeral and meet with Haitian leaders.

The United States and UN have signed a "statement of principles" on coordination on the ground in Haiti. The document outlines cooperation on getting flights into Haiti and security arrangements between UN peacekeepers on the ground, US State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said.

The agreement follows complaints by French aid workers that their shipments were not given adequate priority at the airport, which is being operated by the US military at the request of Haitian officials. The airport's daily capacity has been boosted 10-fold from its pre-quake workload to about 150 landings a day.

US military authorities say that landing clearances are being divided equally between international aid shipments, US aid shipments and US military aircraft.

In one case, a French plane was diverted for five hours to the neighboring Dominican Republic due to inevitable logistical problems such as fuel shortages and slow boarding of evacuees onto departing flights, military sources said.

In places like Mirebalais, 25 miles north-east of the capital, and the Mara Valley, US helicopters and C17s were dropping supplies to sites secured by UN peacekeepers.

The UN's flash appeal for 575 million dollars in emergency relief has received 334 million dollars in donations and pledges, officials in New York said.

"Seldom in the face of such a disaster has the international community acted in such solidarity, nor so quickly in the face of so many difficulties," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said.

Hollywood celebrities held a televised fundraiser Friday evening to spur individual donations. The broadcast featured live performances from London, New York and Los Angeles featuring songs by pop legend Madonna as well as Wyclef Jean, Bruce Springsteen, Jennifer Hudson, Mary J Blige, Shakira and Sting.

Another aftershock of 4.4 magnitude shook Haiti on Friday.

Haitian President Rene Preval, who has drawn the ire of traumatized Haitians for failing to appear in public and communicate with his people, told the Spanish newspaper El Pais that aid relief to his country suffered from a "general lack of coordination."

He dismissed criticism that he had cut an absent figure in the aftermath of the disaster, saying he went out to see the damage every day.

Preval refuted concerns about the massive US military role, with more than 10,000 troops slated to arrive as part of the recovery effort. Help was coming from "many countries, not only from the United States," he said.

Preval estimated that more than 70,000 bodies have been buried so far.

In other developments:

- US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, at a meeting in Toledo, Spain, made clear that the Haiti earthquake "is not an opportunity to immigrate into the United States." Refugees who try to enter the US illegally would be repatriated, she said. The US has extended temporary stays to tens of thousands of Haitians already in the country illegally.

- The United Nations announced that some 15 children have "disappeared" from hospitals in Haiti since the quake. According to Jean Luc Legrand of UNICEF, the UN children fund, the children had been taken out of hospitals "not with their families."

- Spain, which holds the rotating European Union presidency, urged the 27-nation bloc to speed up adoptions of Haitian children who are already being processed. European Justice Commissioner Jacques Barrot said the EU would seek a common "framework" on adoptions, in cooperation with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).

- In the waters off Haiti, dozens of ships dot the water, including the USNS Comfort, a naval hospital that has treated at least hundreds of Haitians since arriving earlier this week. Navy helicopters hopped from ship to ship, delivering personnel, supplies and injured Haitians.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/305329,leadall-aid-shipments-in-high-gear-as-mourning-continues-in-haiti.html.