Senate body votes for ban on all aid to Pakistan
October 14, 1971
SENATE COMMITTEE DISAPPROVES FOREIGN AID TO PAKISTAN
Trimming millions of dollars from President Richard Nixon's foreign aid requests, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee agreed today to end all assistance to Pakistan. The committee voted to ban all forms of foreign aid to Pakistan until the president informed Congress that the situation in East Pakistan was reasonably stable and refugees were allowed to return.
TEN DAYS IN PIPE CITY
Lafayette Park in Washington DC got an opportunity to experience a mock-up of the greatest misery of that time. A miniature refugee city sprung up in the park to offer citizens of Washington a closer view of the refugee camps in India. Organised by the Philadelphia Friends of East Bengal and supported by a number of Bangladesh groups in the region, a series of drainpipe shelters had been set up for a period of 10 days beginning from October 14. This dramatisation of the refugee situation attracted the attention of the public and the press in Washington.
Scores of volunteers from New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Boston arrived in Washington to join the participants in the 10-day programme. The "refugee camp" was run by "camp director" Dick Taylor, who organised the "naval blockade" of the arms-carrying Pakistani ship Padma.
SADRUDDIN LAUNCHES DRIVE TO RAISE FUND FOR REFUGEES
A new fund drive for $558 million to assist more than 90 lakh Bangladesh refugees in India was launched by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan. The high commissioner told newsmen that thousands of refugees were still streaming into Indian camps daily and that the recent monsoon season -- one of the worst in history -- had further worsened the condition of the refugees.
ON THE WAR FRONT
In the Kushtia-Jashore-Khulna sector, Mukti Bahini ambushed the Pakistani army at Bhagjoti and Sukria and killed 20 enemy soldiers and wounded 10. On the same day, Mukti Bahini shelled Pakistani army position at Ramkrishnapur and killed five enemy soldiers. Another group of guerrillas fired on an enemy patrol near Sadipur and killed three Pakistani soldiers.
In the Mymensingh-Sylhet sector, Mukti Bahini ambushed Pakistani troops between Durgapur and Nazirpur and killed two enemy soldiers. On the same day, Mukti Bahini disrupted telecommunications between Kishoreganj and Mymensingh.
Shamsuddoza Sajen is a journalist and researcher. He can be contacted at [email protected]
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