Turkish Charity Train Delivers 750 Tons of Emergency Aid to Afghanistan

Ankara, MINA – A “charity train” carrying 750 tons of emergency aid coordinated by the Turkish government departed for Afghanistan from the Turkish capital Ankara on Thursday.

Turkish Transport and Infrastructure Minister Adil Karaismailoglu said the train carrying aid from 11 humanitarian organizations is coordinated by the Disaster and Emergency Management Agency (AFAD).

“We sent two trains with 47 carriages, carrying around 750 tons of relief goods,” Karaismailoglu said as quoted from Anadolu Agency.

Karaismailoglu said the train would travel 4,168 kilometers to Afghanistan via Iran and Turkmenistan.

Citing the start of the Islamabad-Tehran-Istanbul cargo train last December, he said the charity train would pass through the corridor in 16 days.

Meanwhile, Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu stressed that 12.9 million children in Afghanistan need assistance due to extreme weather conditions.

“Turkey will always side with the Afghan people. Over the past four years, we have become the nation, the nation that provides the most aid in the world,” he said.

The humanitarian agency describes the plight of the Afghan people as one of the world’s fastest growing humanitarian crises.

According to the UN’s office of humanitarian coordination, OCHA, half the population now faces acute hunger, more than nine million people have been displaced, and millions of children are out of school.

Earlier, the United Nations and its partners launched a $4.4 billion funding campaign to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe in Afghanistan by 2022.

The UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has also warned that millions of Afghans are on the verge of death, urging the international community to relinquish Afghan assets and restart its banking system. (T/RE1)

Mi’raj News Agency (MINA)