By Khris Carlson
Montana Kaimin
U. Montana

(U-WIRE) MISSOULA, Mont. -- It is estimated that more children have died after the Gulf War from sanctions-related causes than had died during the war, a member of a delegation to Iraq said Monday night at the University of Montana.

Jonis Davis travelled to Iraq in June as a member of a team sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee to explore what plausible activities AFSC might undertake to help ease the effects UN sanctions have had on people there.

Since UN sanctions were imposed on the oil rich country, an AFSC report estimates that a minimum of 200,000 children under the age of five have died as a result to malnutrition and disease- deaths that Jonis said could have been avoided if UN sanctions did not impede upon the transfer of adequate food and medical supplies into Iraq.

"The suffering as a result of the sanctions was so severe, about three years ago the food-for-oil program began with proceeds closely monitored by the U.N.," Jonis said.

In 1996, lacking revenue to supply its people with food, Iraq agreed to a U.N. resolution which allowed it to sell oil to finance food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies.

But according to Jonis, revenues brought into the country from the sale of oil fall short of what is needed.

"The food for oil program wasn't to solve the problem but to maintain the problem," Jonis said, quoting a U.N. official as saying the program was to prevent malnutrition from rising above 23 percent, supporting a theory that the objective of the U.N. is to keep Iraq weak.

"(Iraqis) don't interpret their leader as the problem; the U.S. is the problem," said Jonis, pointing out that an internal overthrow of President Saddam Hussein is improbable.

For now, AFSC is focusing its efforts on medical aid and school reconstruction. The organization is seeking to arrange partnerships between Iraqi and American schools while raising funds to buy school supplies and desks.

(C) 1999 Montana Kaimin via U-WIRE