Iraq’s Children Dying, Unicef Director Says

With talks on Iraqi oil sales stalled and no end to sanctions in sight, about 4,500 children under the age of 5 are dying every month in Iraq of hunger or disease, Carol Bellamy, the executive director of UNICEF, said on Monday.

Bellamy, a former director of the Peace Corps, was appealing at a news conference for donations from governments to help the neediest Iraqis whose living conditions are deteriorating sharply.

U.N. members have provided only $1.6 million of the $39.9 million requested by the United Nations last month to carry the organization’s relief program through this year.

UNICEF had hoped to receive $10 million for essential childhood medicines and food supplements in Iraq. More than half of Iraqi women and children are receiving less than 50 percent of their daily caloric requirements, officials say.

At the same news conference on Monday, Catherine Bertini, director of the U.N. World Food Program, said her organization needed $19 million to aid 2.15 million “highly vulnerable people.” Among those are 180,000 malnourished children and 900,000 war widows.