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Middle East
UN suspends aid to Gaza
Article published on the 2008-04-24 Latest update 2008-04-24 15:35 TU
Gaza street after an Israeli raid
(Photo: Reuters)
UN agencies have suspended aid distribution to the Gaza Strip because they have run out of fuel for their vehicles. They feed more than a million people in the territory which is under an Israeli blockade.
The UN Relief and works Agency and the World Food Programme (WFP), suspended deliveries of aid because they say they don't have the diesel for the trucks which transport it.
Israel imposed a blockade on the territory when the Islamic party Hamas took power there.
Hamdi Shakura of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights in Gaza City says that "life is paralysed".
Earlier, European Union Humanitarian Aid Commissoner Louis Michel declared it "unacceptable" that the UN might have to suspend humanitarian operations because it lacks diesel for its trucks and appealed to Israel to ensure that the fuel was available.
Israel claims that Hamas is preventing distribution of one million litres of fuel delivered to a terminal near the border.
Earlier, Israel welcomed a walkout from the UN Security Council by French ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert, who was joined by his Belgian and British counterparts.
They say that Libya's deputy representative Ibrahim Dabbashi compared the situation in the territory to a concentration camp.
