PETER SNOW:                And to discuss the refugee 
and relief crisis, I'm joined by Justin Forsyth of Oxfam. Now what no one 
doubts is that there is here the potential for a humanitarian disaster. 
As in the war over Kosovo, but to a far greater extent, we're faced with 
the prospect of what could be a catastrophe. Up to seven million people 
could be at risk this winter. There are hundreds of thousands who've fled 
to refugee camps along the Northern borders of Afghanistan and of course, 
most of them, the vast mass of the refugees, here along the border with 
Pakistan, just inside Pakistan. But the really severe problem is the plight 
of people inside Afghanistan. Some displaced by fear of the fighting and 
the bombing, others like the Hazaras up here in their mountain villages 
to the West of Kabul, in the Hindu Kush mountains cut off completely and 
largely dependent on relief aid supplies by the agencies. Now the aid workers 
say the bombing is now making delivery almost impossible and in only a 
month's time the winter will be upon them and snow will effectively prevent 
supplies reaching them at all.
                        
                              Furthermore the 
Taliban were reported three days ago to have seized the agencies' supply 
depots in Kandahar and Kabul up here. But it's not clear yet whether supplies 
there have been looted, and one agency tells us the Taliban have actually 
handed back the depot in Kabul - with the supplies intact. The aid agencies 
say they need to move no less than fifty two thousand tons of aid from 
their dumps here in Pakistan, down opposite Kabul there, and here opposite 
Kandahar, into Afghanistan for distribution in the next month. And that's 
up to fifteen hundred tons a day. But the bombing, they say, and obstruction 
by the Taliban makes this impossible. One convoy for example left here 
in Pakistan and went off towards Kabul Tuesday last week with thirteen 
hundred tons but hasn't yet reported reaching its destination. So what 
is to be done? Justin, have you yet heard what's happened to that convoy?

JUSTIN FORSYTH:                We haven't heard yet what's 
happened to this United Nations convoy, but what we do know is that we 
need convoys like that every day. We need fifteen hundred tons of food, 
maybe even up to seventeen hundred tons a day going into Afghanistan. That 
convoy might have reached its destination, what we're hearing though, is 
that most food isn't getting to where we are working, which is in the very 
rural areas of Afghanistan, we're working in that central region that you 
talk about, and we have no food at all, and we're responsible for feeding 
one-hundred-thousand people just in that area along.

SNOW:                    Now do you recognise you're 
very unlikely to get a pause on the bombing and that you're going to have 
to cope with the bombing continuing when you try and do this. 

FORSYTH:                    Well we would like a pause 
in the bombing. We think it would actually help us to get food to people 
in need. And it is getting very desperate in Afghanistan. But what we're 
saying, if we don't get a pause, if we want commitments from all sides, 
including the Taliban, but also the Northern Alliance to do everything 
possible to allow us to deliver aid. What we're hearing in these very remote 
areas is that people are beginning to eat roots and grass, they've run 
out of food, and we're in a race against time. Winter will come in a few 
weeks and then it will be impossible to get to them. People think of Afghanistan 
as a hot country. In the middle of winter, the oil, the acid in your motor 
car freezes, it's that cold.

SNOW:                    Okay Justin Forsyth, thank 
you very much indeed. John?