Soufriere Hills volcano threatens to erupt again

Britain Imposes Partial Freeze on Aid to Montserrat

He told the BBC that of the £41m in spending programmes pledged by the International Development Secretary, Clare Short, some has been put on hold while London waits to see just how many Montserratians decide to leave the island.

Montserrat is under constant threat from an active volcano that has destroyed large parts of the island.

Frank Savage: admits London is re-assessing the crisis

"Some of the programmes are temporarily on hold," he said. "When the British Government was requested to start the voluntary phased evacuation last week there was, I would think, in London a natural concern about how many people are we going to be dealing with after the evacuation."

This revelation comes on the day that a new Government body set up to examine the crisis meets for the first time to discuss ways of dealing with the citizens of Montserrat.

The creation of the cross-departmental group is seen by some as a snub to Clare Short who has been handling the issue of compensation for evacuees.

Scientists monitoring the volcano say that they expect it to become more dangerous in the next few days, with big avalanches of red hot rock and, perhaps, explosions from its crater.

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