1. Food supplies via Turkey are increasing dramatically.

2. As of Wednesday morning, WFP has sent 1,607 trucks containing about 38,177 mt of food aid into Iraq from Turkey (enough for about 2.7 million people for one month-Note that the three Kurdish provinces which are the major targets of this route have about 3.6 million people benefiting from these food commodities).

3. Yesterday nearly 4,000 metric tons were dispatched from turkey and we are working to increase the daily average even further.

4. The major escalation in food deliveries to the three northern governorates, instituted by WFP on April 14, means the food stocks in Kurdish-controlled areas are approaching pre-war food security levels, allowing the agency to focus on reaching areas in former GOI territory where food distributions were effectively frozen during the conflict.

5. This new outreach will enable WFP to respond to spot appeals for aid, such as the one made by the Mosul Ministry of Health for food aid to patients in the general hospitals of this city. WFP is conducting a rapid assessment of the 14 hospitals identified by the health authorities. These hospitals have about 2,661 beds.

6. Inside Iraq: A massive convoy made up of 194 trucks (carrying a total of 4,218 mt of food) left Dohuk this morning for three different destinations, including the city of Kirkuk.

   i. Twenty-one trucks carrying 477 mt of lentils are due to arrive in Kirkuk this afternoon carrying the first food aid to this city since the conflict began. The trucks are taking what is called the "front road," a direct route from Dohuk via Mosul that cuts the driving time down to some 5 hours.

   ii. WFP staff have already prepared the warehouse in Kirkuk for the reception of the food, cleaning the facility and repairing damage incurred by looters. This delivery is particularly significant because the warehouse is virtually empty, containing only 328 mt of vegetable oil.

   iii. Another 19 trucks (374 mt chickpeas, 50 mt sugar) are rolling toward Erbil

   iv. The remaining 154 trucks (875 mt wheat flour, 1,633 mt lentils, 298 mt sugar, 378 mt HEBs, 131 mt vegetable oil) are heading for Sulamaniyah.

7. A WFP team visited Nassiriya (the capital city of Thi Qar province in Southern Iraq) earlier this week and found out that food prices have skyrocketed (inflated by 250 to 700 percent) in the market. However, four main markets are functioning in the province (Background: Said Saad, Thowra, Shoala, Bakr.) The markets are partially open seven days a week but not all commodities are available in the shops.

8. The Public Distribution System can be re-activated in Thi Qar as food agents are ready and able to resume operations when food stocks are available. As a matter of fact, some of them are still partially operating to distribute some of the remaining stocks left over from before the war. These stocks are wheat flour and about 10% of the population who did not receive the last flour ration are being assisted. This distribution should be completed this week. More stocks will be urgently needed if the majority of the population in Thi Qar are to receive their regular rations next month. More than 1.5 million people live in this Southern Iraqi province.

9. The mills' manager for the governorate reiterated that all six mills in Thi Qar are operating (dry milling) but wheat stocks are dwindling and should be over in May.

10. The majority of the Ministry of Trade staff for the warehouses are available and ready to continue working if the operation resumes but they are concerned about the payment of their salaries.

11. On funding:

    So far WFP has received US$341 million from donors (see the list below). This is one billion dollar short of the expected cost of our operation.

    List of donors:

    The United States (US$281 million), Canada (US$13.8 million), Japan (US$13.2 million), the United Kingdom (US$13 million), Germany (US$6.5 million), the Netherlands (US$5 million), Finland (US$2.2 million), Spain (US$1.6 million), Norway (US$1.4 million), Italy (US$1.1 million), Denmark (US$578,034) New Zealand (US$564,972) and Republic of Korea (US$1 million).

WHO national staff, more than 350 people in total, are working in many Iraqi communities to help kick-start medical services.It also involves investigating and following up on the infrastructure needs which support medical facilities, including electricity, running water and waste removal. WHO teams are currently conducting and following up on investigations in Baghdad (where three teams are working).

Baghdad
A team composed of a WHO epidemiologist and engineers, plus Iraqi microbiologists from the National Public Health Laboratories, is rebuilding the laboratories' capacity to analyse blood and other samples. These laboratories are crucial as prompt analysis and diagnosis of samples brought to the laboratories will allow timely identification and consequent control of diseases, including outbreaks of diarrheal diseases or measles.

WHO is also working urgently to re-start the activities of Baghdad's blood bank. The Jordanian Ministry of Health has agreed to provide, on loan, 50 kits each to test for Hepatitis C (Hepatitis C Virus ) HIV and Hepatitis B. WHO will forward the kits to Baghdad as soon as possible.

Mosul
WHO with the Department of Health is moving a convoy of 3 trucks filled with urgently needed medical supplies and food, from Dohuk to Mosul. The medical supplies include intravenous drip bottles, blood bags, kits for determining blood type, and adrenalin. Three WHO national staff, an information technology specialist, a biomedical engineer and a civil engineer - are moving with the convoy to Mosul in order to assist with the kick-starting of health services there. WHO teams continue to operate in Mosul and, by tomorrow, a complete inventory of the city's needs will be ready.

Kirkuk
WHO reports from Kirkuk that life appears to be returning to normal: electricity and water are both functioning. This news is very positive for the functioning of the health system in Kirkuk. WHO also reports that coordination between WHO and local partners including NGOs, other UN agencies and local authorities is going well and contributing to the smooth functioning of health services.

Peter Kessler, Spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for the Refugees (UNHCR)

First refugees arrive in Jordan's Ruweished camp:
The Jordanian government has admitted some 300 Palestinian refugees coming from Iraq, among them people who were stuck in no-man's-land for nearly three weeks.

These refugees arrived in a series of convoys from the border since late Monday night, and are currently sheltered in the UNHCR/Jordanian Hashemite Charity Organisation (JHCO) camp at Ruweished. The last group to arrive crossed into Jordan in the early hours of this morning aboard buses hired by the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).

Twenty-seven Iraqi war refugees, some of whom have been waiting for three weeks for entry into the camps at Ruweished, are still in no-man's-land separating Jordan from Iraq. UNHCR's Representative in Jordan, Sten Bronee, met with government officials today regarding this group, and was informed that they will be admitted to the camp at Ruweished.

Finally, more than 850 Iranians remain in the no-man's-land at Al Karama, most of them ethnic Kurds from the Al Tash refugee camp.

Some Iraqi refugees in Saudi Arabia request to return:
Despite the unsettled situation in Iraq, some 150 Iraqi refugees living in Saudi Arabia's Rafha refugee camp have indicated a willingness to return home as soon as possible. Senior UNHCR staff from our Riyadh office are in Rafha camp today to meet with these refugees. They are also talking to some of the more than 5,200 other Iraqis in the camp who are watching the situation in their homeland, apparently also hoping to go back when the situation stabilizes.

Saudi Arabia established Rafha and Artewiya camps in 1991 to shelter some of the more than 93,000 Iraqis who fled into Saudi Arabia and Coalition-controlled areas of southern Iraq. Most of the original Iraqi refugees returned to their homeland in the months following the end of that conflict, and Artewiya was closed in late 1992. Rafha initially sheltered 33,000 people, but over the years over 25,000 were resettled to third countries and more than 3,500 opted to voluntarily return home.

We prefer that any repatriation to Iraq should wait until there is proper security and a stable supply of humanitarian aid.

UNHCR staff on mission in southern Iraq:
A UNHCR staff member from our Kuwait City office is on mission today in the southern Iraqi town of Umm Qasr making contact with local officials.

This is the second mission by a UN refugee agency (UNHCR) staff member into Iraq in as many days * yesterday one of our colleagues accompanied a multi-agency mission that traveled 75 kilometers into western Iraq to check on security up to

Rutba, and in the area around the Trebil border crossing.

Over the coming days we are planning to send additional staff deeper into southern Iraq. The focus of these planned overland missions is to learn how some 5,500 Iranian marsh Arab refugees * ethnic Ahwazis * settled east of Diwaniyah at Dujaila, Ali Al Gharbi and Al Kumeit, have come through the war. We will also be checking on their willingness to possibly repatriate back to Iran. More than 1,100 Iranian refugees repatriated from Iraq in 2002.

During these planned missions in southern Iraq, our staff will also meet with local leaders, and over time, look into the capacity of communities to absorb any Iraqi refugees who might be willing to repatriate from neighbouring Iran.

Iran shelters some 202,000 Iraqi refugees * last year only some 460 Iraqi Arabs and 675 Iraqi Kurds opted to return from Iran, down from previous years.

Questions and Answers

Q: Jordan Times: Do you know the percentage of people in Baghdad that have electricity & I know water supplies are problematic so are there any plants that are a week away from being fixed or is there an estimate when all of them are going to be fixed & running?

A: V. Taveau: To our knowledge, only 30% of the city has electricity at the moment. We know that ICRC & local contractors are working on 40 water pumps in the city of Baghdad.

Q: Jordan Times: UNHCR, you mentioned a colleague of yours went to check out the conditions in western Iraq, near Jordan; can you tell us what they found?

A: P. Kessler: He was part of an inter-agency security mission; they traveled about 75km into Iraq. It was fairly uneventful, they understood that there has been, further eastwards, an incident on Sunday, apparently in Ramadi when a car of journalists was attacked by bandits & forced of the road. Apparently nobody was harmed, but they were robbed of some equipment & other personal effects. Other than that, they traveled up to Rutbah, which has a small market, which appears to be working & the town appears, at least the area of the market they saw, appears to be mostly untouched by the conflict. Those were the main highlights.

Q: Jordan Times: You said it was a part of an inter-agency security mission, is this part of the team, which will decide when the UN team can go back into Iraq, as we know they have already went in the north?

A: V. Taveau: In order to be able to go back to Baghdad, we need a UN security assessment mission led by UNSECOR, so that means we are still on stand by. As you know the situation in Baghdad remains very difficult at the moment so that team is still on stand by.

Q: So this security mission was not apart of this arrangement, this is different?

A: V. Taveau: I don't really know, so I will double check & let you know.

P. Kessler: To my understanding this mission is filing a report to the appropriate security authorities in New York. Obviously it is a part of a wider effort to learn what is going on there.

Q: Are there any refugees still stuck in the No Man's Land & what will happen if a third country will not accept the refugees now in the camps, the Mujahidee Khalk refugees?

A: P. Kessler: As I mentioned there are some 27 Iraqi refugees waiting in the No Man's Land; the government has been dragging its feet for some weeks, but they should be, we were told by a minister this afternoon, letting these people into Jordan, hopefully very soon. There are some 850 other refugees in the No Man's Land, Iranians & we are working to find a solution for these people; obviously man of them came from a well-established camp in Iraq & ideally it would be nice if they could return back there, but we are looking at other solutions for this group.

Q: Are you contacting any third country?

A: P. Kessler: Well, there are some 58 refugees from among this group, which have been recognized by various other states. It is up to them to decide, due to their long-standing recognition for this population, how they want to deal with them.

Q: We heard that some ambassadors in Amman offered asylum for them, do you have more information about that?

A: P. Kessler: As I mentioned some of these people have been recognized by various European, North American & Australian countries; you may wish to speak to those governments & find out what they are doing, they can speak for themselves.