Irish Times, 12th October 2005

Letter to the Editor by John O'Shea

Madam, - The disaster in Pakistan once again brings into sharp focus the fact that the international community simply does not have the mechanisms in place to deal with either humanitarian or man-made disasters when they occur.

In the past 10 months, millions of lives have been lost in the wake of the Indian Ocean tsunami, massive floods in India, hurricanes Katrina and Stan in the US and central America, famine in Niger, and now the Pakistan earthquake. Man-made crises too have taken their toll in northern Uganda and Darfur, where a brutal campaign of state-sponsored violence has led to the deaths of up to 300,000 people, and the lives of another 2 million displaced people hang in the balance.

And still the international community's capacity to respond is seriously wanting. We need to get serious: until such a time as we have an international rapid-response force, capable of rushing into a beleaguered area at a moment's notice and delivering life-saving assistance, the fall-out of disasters will continue to wreak havoc and inflict further suffering on the distraught.

When will the lessons be learnt? Early action saves lives and helps prevent a deadly spiral of disease, hunger and displacement from spinning out of control. - Yours, etc,

JOHN O'SHEA,
GOAL, PO Box 19,
Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.