From: EMERGENCY Headquarters
Milan - Italy - 18th May 2001
- Following the numerous requests and telepone calls which have reached EMERGENCY's headquarters in Milan, the organisation has decided to make this press release to relate the events which took place yesterday in its hospital at Kabul and to clarify the information spread by various agencies.
Late morning yesterday the Taliban religious police, made up of about 25 people, forced their way into EMERGENCY's hospital by climbing over the perimeter wall and threatening the hospital staff.
The group of police, armed with kalashnikovs and whips, forced all the members of EMERGENCY's national and international staff present in the hospital to kneel down and held them at gun point for nearly two hours. Some of them were even beaten with branches ripped from the trees and used as whips. Three members of the local staff were arrested for having put up resistance and have not yet been released.
The hospital medical coordinator, Kate Rowlands, immediately called the Taliban Foreign Minister and the Head of Security who, after carrying out an immediate inspection of the hospital, confirmed that it was run as stipulated by the agreement signed with them.
This serious occurrence means that the hospital cannot function and guarantee the safety of staff and patients; for this reason EMERGENCY has decided to suspend its activities. The patients have been transferred to other hospitals and provided with the necessary drugs to ensure the continuation of their treatment whilst the less serious cases, no longer in need of treatment, have been discharged.
Gino Strada and the other people in charge of the project in Afghanistan are trying to arrange top level meetings with the Taliban authorities to clarify the situation and establish when it will be possible to reopen the hospital, in order to provide the population of Kabul with the medical and surgical care they so desperately need.
The Surgical Centre for War Victims in Kabul, financed by the Italian Cooperation, was opened on 25th April and the agreement with the Taliban Health Ministry was signed by both parties on 13th December 2000.
We thank everyone for their collaboration.
mailto: fosu@emergency.it