6A - Thursday, January 31, 2013
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
U.N. votes to send $1.5
billion in aid to Syria
More than 2 million
Syrians have
been uprooted
KUWAIT CITY (AP) - An
emergency U.N. appeal to raise
$1.5 billion in humanitarian
aid for.Syria exceeded its goal
Wednesday at a conference
with dire predictions of rising
civilian costs and Jordan's king
saying the refugee crunch has
pushed his nation's resources
to the breaking point.
"We are sending a message
to Syrians: You are not alone,"
said U.N. Secretary-Gener-
al Ban Ki-Moon even as he
described Syria as caught in a
"death spiral" and the condi-
tions for many civilians a "liv-
ing hell."
Wealthy Gulf nations - tra-
ditionally on the sidelines as
major donors to U.N. aid efforts
- took the lead in the latest
drive with at least $900 mil-
lion offered in a sign of their
expanding political profile
since the Arab Spring and their
role as critical regional backers
of the Syrian rebels.
But the success of swiftly
pulling together the funds was
tempered by reminders that
the aid is expected to cover the
relief costs only until summer,
highlighting the massive bur-
den to cope with needs from
Syria's civil war and its spill-
over ina region where refugees
are sometimes pouring into
camps at the rate of 3,000 a
day. The concern was evident
from Ban even as he lauded
the current outpouring, noting
that more nations will be asked
to give and others may have to
dig deeper as the Syrian crisis
grows.
The current pledges also
will likely face close scrutiny
on how quickly the money
will reach over-stretched 'aid
groups directed by the U.N.
and other agencies. Officials
in Egypt and elsewhere have
complained that many gener-
ous international offers for
help after the Arab Spring
upheavals have not yet mate-
rialized.
Another serious challenge is
trying to gain access to civil-
ians in rebel-held territory,
aid officials said. The U.N. and
other international groups
must operate out of the Syrian
capital, Damascus, and can be
left struggling to arrange con-
voys through battle lines and
making contacts with opposi-
tion groups.
"We know we are not reach-
ing all the people who need
to be reached," said the U.N.'s
humanitarian chief, Valerie
Amos, who held talks earlier
this week with Syrian officials.
Ban opened the one-day
gathering in Kuwait by. call-
ing for an end to the fighting
"in the name of humanity," yet
noted that the fighting shows
no signs of easing and crises
such as the refugee exodus to
places such as Turkey and Jor-
dan could intensify.
Jordan's economic council
said the country was already
pushed to the limit.
The kingdom has spent
more than $833 million on
aid for refugees - accounting
for nearly half the estimated
700,000 people who have fled
Syria - and that it was unable
to sustain a financial burden
that has so far siphoned off
about 3 percent of its GDP.
Some U.N. officials say the
refugee figures could approach
1 million later this year if the
conflict in Syria does not ease.
"We have reached the end
of the line. We have exhausted
our resources," said Jordan's
King Abdullah II.
Last week, the king ampli-
fied, his appeal for internation-
al help at the World Economic
Forum in Davos, Switzerland,
saying "the weakest refugees
are struggling now just to sur-
vive this year's harsh winter"
and up to 3,000 a day are still
crossing the Syria-Jordan bor-
der.
In his opening remarks to
delegates at the donors' con-
ference, Ban urged all sides
"and particularly the Syrian
government" to halt attacks
in the 22-month-old civil war
that the U.N. says has claimed
more than 60,000 lives.
"In the name of humanity,
stop the killing, stop the vio-
lence," Ban told envoys from
nearly 60 nations, including
Russia and Iran, key allies of
Assad's regime. .
Aid officials estimate that
more than 2 million Syrians
have been uprooted or are
suffering inside the coun-
try as the conflict widens --
including what peace envoy
Lakhdar Brahimi called
"unprecedented levels of hor-
ror" in an address to the U.N.
Security Council after at least
65 bodies were found Tuesday
in a suspected execution-style
killing near Aleppo.
, Before the latest donors'
conference, Ban described
the international humanitar-
ian response to Syria as "very
much limited" in comments
to the official Kuwaiti News
Agency.
But the meeting opened
with Kuwait's ruler, Sheik
Sabah Al Ahmad Al Sabah,
promising $300 million. It
was quickly matched by Gulf
partners Saudi Arabia and the
United Arab Emirates, which
are all major backers of Syrian
rebel factions.
Among other contributions
that pushed the total past the
U.N. goal was $184 million
from Gulf non-government
groups and charities.
On Tuesday, the European
Union and the U.S. promised
a total of nearly $300 million.
The head of the U.S. del-
egation, Assistant Secretary of
State Anne Richard, lauded the
donations from Gulf nations,
which often bankroll their
own aid efforts but are not
traditional top donors to U.N.
programs. She noted, however,
that the humanitarian funds
are to deal only with imme-
diate needs over the coming
months.
"It's good for now, but pre-
dictions are that it's not going
to be over soon," said Richard,
who deals with refugee and
migration affairs.
A
SUSAN WALSH/Daily
Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), who was seriously injured in the mass shooting that killed six people in Tucson, Ariz,
two years ago, sits with her husband, Mark Kelly, on Capitol Hill in Washington Wednesday.
Giffords pleads for gun reform
At Senate hearing,
former rep. makes
emotional remarks
WASHINGTON (AP) -
Severely wounded and still
recovering, former Rep. Gabri-
elle Giffords begged lawmakers
at an emotional hearing Wednes-
day to act quickly to curb fire-
arms because "Americans are
counting on you." Not everyone
agreed, underscoring the nation-
al political divide over gun con-
trol.
Giffords' 80-word plea was
the day's most riveting moment,
delivered in a hushed, halting
voice two years after the Arizona
Democrat suffered head wounds
in a Tucson shooting spree that
killed six people. The session
also came two months after 20
first-graders and six womenwere
slain by a gunman who invaded
Sandy Hook Elementary School
in Newtown, Conn.
At the same hearing, a top.
official of the National Rifle
Association rejected Democratic
proposals to ban assault weapons
and high-capacity ammunition
magazines and said requiring
background checks for all gun
purchases would be ineffective
because the Obama administra-
tion isn't doing enough to enforce
the law as it is.
Even if stronger background
checks did identify a criminal,
"as long as you let him go, you're
not keeping him from getting
a gun and you're not prevent-
ing him from getting to the next
crime scene," said Wayne LaPi-
erre, the NRA's executive vice
president. He said poor enforce-
ment is "a national disgrace."
Giffords, who retired from
Congress last year, focused dur-
ing her brief appearance on the
carnage from armed assailants.
"Too many children are
dying," she said at the Senate
Judiciary Committee hearing.
"Too many children. We must do
something. It will be hard, but
the time is now."
Guiding her in and remain-
ing to testify was Mark Kelly,
the retired astronaut who is
Giffords' husband. The cou-
ple, who both owns guns, has
formed a political action com-
mittee called Americans for
Cal
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Responsible Solutions that
backs lawmakers who support
gun restrictions.
"We're simply two reasonable
Americans who realize we have
a problem with gun violence and
we need Congress to act," Kelly
said.
Wednesday's session played
out in a hearing room packed
to capacity. While both sides
appealed to their followers
beforehand to arrive early and
fill the room, most in the public
audience of around 150 appeared
to be gun-control sympathizers,
including relatives of the shoot-
ings at Virginia Tech.
"There should be gun control,"
said Neeta Datt of Burtonsville,
Md., who with Christa Burton
of Silver Spring, Md., was first
on line for public seats. Both
are members of Organizing for
Action, the Obama political orga-
nization that is now pushing his
legislative agenda.
The hearing kicked off a
year in which President Barack
Obama and members of Con-
gress are promising to make gun
restrictions atop priority. Obama
has already proposed requir-
ing background checks for all
gun sales and reviving both
an assault weapons ban and a
10-round limit on the size of
ammunition magazines, and
several Democrats have intro-
duced bills addressing those
and other limitations.
After the hearing, Giffords
and Kelly met privately with
Obama at the White House.
At the Capitol, senators'
remarks during the hearing
illustrated the gulf between
the two parties.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas,
joined others in lauding Gif-
fords but expressed little inter-
est in curbing firearms.
"Unfortunately in Wash-
ington, emotion I think often
leads to bad policies," said
Cruz, a freshman elected with
strong tea-party backing. He
said gun control efforts too
often "restrain the liberties
of law-abiding citizens," not
criminals.
Republicans blamed the
nation's gun troubles on a list
of maladies including a lack
of civility, violent video games
and insufficient attention to
people with mental problems.
Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa,
top Republican on the panel,
said that while he welcomed
the renewed focus on guns,
"The deaths in Newtown
should not be used to put for-
ward any gun control proposal
that's been floating around for
years."
Democrats countered
that a need to improve gun
restrictions was obvious. Sen.
Charles Schumer of New York
said omitting gun limits from
the debate "is like not includ-
ing cigarettes when discussing
lung cancer."
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are not the only hurdles Demo-
crats face in trying to push gun
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this year. It is also unclear what '
several Democratic senators
facing re-election in GOP-lean-
ing states in 2014 will do, such
as including Sens. Max Bau-
cus of Montana, Mark Begich
of Alaska and Mark Pryor- of
Arkansas.
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