Word: reliefs
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...from the sea, Ojukwu faced an overwhelming problem: how to feed a nation of 7,000,000 by air. A consortium of Catholic and Protestant relief agencies organized an air force of lumbering four-engine propeller airplanes to supply Biafra despite protests from Gowon that they were prolonging the war and violating Nigerian airspace...
...damage and help the victims. In Washington, for example, President Nixon used the White House hot line twice last week to talk to Britain's Prime Minister Harold Wilson about aiding the defeated rebels. The East Bloc countries, however, withheld compassion. The Polish press insisted that Western relief activities were "gross interference in Nigeria's internal affairs...
Gowon seemed to agree. To punish those who had aided Biafra during the war, he barred any aid from several agencies and nations. "Let them keep their blood money," he declared angrily. "Let them keep their bloody relief supplies." Nigeria's chief was particularly annoyed with Pope Paul VI, who told a crowd in St. Peter's Square that "the victory of arms may carry with it the killing of numberless people. There are those who actually fear a kind of genocide." Gowon, whose tactics for three years have been designed to limit casualties, bristled at the reference...
Judging by initial reports from the collapsed Biafran pocket, the sword of genocide was a lesser threat than the strangling knot of slow starvation. Some Biafrans, according to relief workers, had not eaten for eight days before the capitulation. Afterward, they fled into the bush, where there was nothing to chew on but butterflies. Even so, Gowon allowed no aid without approval from Lagos. "Nigeria will do this itself," he said firmly...
Despite what appears to be misguided chauvinism on the relief issue, Gowon seemed prepared to behave as a generous victor in other respects. To the Ibos in general, he said: "We know that most of you were dragged into this. May I welcome you back into the fold?" The general called for three days of prayer and pleaded with the remainder of Nigeria's 53 million people not to reject the Ibo rebels. "Let us join hands to build a truly united and great nation," he said...