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Police officers monitor a crowd as earthquake victims receive supplies during the distribution of food and water at the "4 Chemins" crossroads in Les Cayes, Haiti, Aug 20, 2021. (Photo: AFP/Reginald Louissant Jr) - 

US military aircraft are now flying food, tarps and other material into southern Haiti amid a shift in the international relief effort to focus on helping people in the areas hardest hit by the recent earthquake to make it through hurricane season.

Aircraft flying out of the capital, Port-au-Prince, arrived throughout the day Saturday (Aug 28) in the mostly rural, mountainous southern peninsula that was the epicenter of the Aug 14 earthquake. In Jeremie, people waved and cheered as a Marine Corps unit from North Carolina descended in a tilt-rotor Osprey with pallets of rice, tarps and other supplies.

Most of the material, however, wasn't destined for Jeremie. It was for distribution to remote mountain communities where landslides destroyed homes and the small plots of the many subsistence farmers in the area, said Patrick Tine of Haiti Bible Mission, one of several groups coordinating the delivery of aid.

“They lost their gardens, they lost their animals,” Tine said as he took a break from helping unload boxes of rice. “The mountains slid down and they lost everything.”

At the request of the Haitian government, getting as much help to such people as fast as possible is now the focus of the US$32 million US relief effort, said Tim Callahan, a disaster response team leader for the US Agency for International Development.

In the immediate aftermath of the magnitude 7.2 earthquake, which killed more than 2,200 people and damaged or destroyed more than 100,000 homes, the focus was on search and rescue.

That was complicated by heavy rain from Tropical Storm Grace as well as earthquake damage to roads and bridges, in an area where the infrastructure was in bad shape to begin with. The threat of gangs, in a country still reeling from the Jul 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moise, also made it hard to distribute aid. As a a result, many Haitians had grown increasingly impatient with relief efforts.

“We're just trying to get as much material out to the most affected areas as fast as we can. If you do that, then the frustration level goes down," Callahan said over the roar of helicopters at the Port-au-Prince airport, where US troops and civilian aid workers labored to load aircraft with pallets in the hot sun.

That is where the US military comes into play. Troops under the direction of Miami-based Southern Command have so far delivered more than 265,000 pounds of relief assistance.

Among those troops is the unit from North Carolina, known as the Fighting Griffins and based at the New River Marine Corps Air Station, which allowed Associated Press journalists to come along as they delivered emergency supplies.

Two crews took off from Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, flew to Port-au-Prince to pick up supplies, and then made multiple trips across the mountainous southern peninsula to deliver their loads.

It was an upbeat mission, with the flight crew and pilots helping the Haitian aid workers unload the aircraft, then shaking hands as they said their goodbyes.

One crew, which delivered more than 8,500 pounds of goods on Saturday alone, brought along a Marine of Haitian descent from New York City as their interpreter. “It really means a lot to me to do something like this,” said Lance Corporal Lunel Najac.

The US effort is expected to continue at least for several more weeks, though whether it will be enough to get people through the rest of the hurricane season remains to be seen.

“People need food, water, tents, tarps,” said Wilkens Sanon of Mission of Hope Foundation, another of the groups working with the US to channel aid to people who need it most.

“It is very, very bad right now,” he said//CNA

A medical worker administers a COVID-19 test in Auckland, New Zealand on Aug 26, 2021. (Photo: Reuters/Fiona Goodall) - 

New Zealand reported 83 locally acquired cases on Sunday (Aug 29) of the highly infectious Delta coronavirus variant, with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern saying that some changes on how the outbreak is managed could be announced on Monday.

Ardern on Friday extended the lockdown for the country of 5.1 million until midnight on Tuesday, after which the restrictions were to ease slightly. Auckland, however, which is the epicentre of the outbreak was to remain locked down for longer. 

Ardern said her government was seeking more information on the spread of the infections.

"If we need to tighten up our restrictions further, we will," she told a televised briefing.

Of the Sunday cases, 82 were reported in Auckland, New Zealand's largest city, and the other was in the capital, Wellington.

New Zealanders had been living virtually virus-free and without curbs until the August outbreak. So far, the country has recorded just over 3,100 confirmed coronavirus cases since the start of the pandemic and 26 related deaths, according to the health ministry.

Of the current community cases, 34 people were in hospital and two of them in intensive care. Active community cases stand at 511, with 496 of them in Auckland.

"Having positive cases in our communities, along with the impact of lockdowns I know can be hugely unsettling, and that uncertainty can impact everyone's mental health," Ardern said, announcing additional financial resources for mental health and urging people to seek help.

"So, it's OK to feel overwhelmed, to feel upset, or even to feel frustrated because this situation is often all of those things."//CNA

Members of the British armed forces 16 Air Assault Brigade walk to the air terminal after disembarking a Royal Airforce Voyager aircraft at Brize Norton, Britain August 28, 2021. Alastair Grant/ Pool via REUTERS - 

The last British flight evacuating civilians from Afghanistan has left Kabul, bringing to an end an operation that has airlifted almost 15,000 Afghan and British citizens in the two weeks since the Taliban took control.

Britain's armed forces are now preparing to leave and will take small numbers of Afghan citizens with them on remaining flights this weekend, a defence ministry spokesperson said on Saturday (Aug 28).

"It's time to close this phase of the operation down. But we haven't forgotten the people who still need to leave, and we will do everything we can to help them," Britain's ambassador to Afghanistan, Laurie Bristow, said in a statement filmed on the tarmac at Kabul's main airport.

Some British troops have already departed, and a British military transport plane carrying armed forces members landed at an airbase in southern England on Saturday.

British defence minister Ben Wallace said on Friday that Britain was entering the final hours of its evacuation and would process only people who were already inside Kabul airport.

Britain was at Washington's side from the start of a US led invasion of Afghanistan that overthrew the then-ruling Taliban in punishment for harbouring the al Qaeda militants behind the Sep 11, 2001 attacks. More than 450 British armed forces personnel died during two decades of deployment in the country.

Wallace said on Friday that he estimated between 800 and 1,100 Afghans who had worked with Britain and were eligible to leave the country would not make it through. General Nick Carter, the head of Britain's armed forces, told the BBC on Saturday that the total would be in the "high hundreds".

Many Afghans unable to leave judged it was too dangerous to travel to Kabul airport, Carter said.

"People like me ... we are forever receiving messages and texts from our Afghan friends that are very distressing. We're living this in the most painful way," he added.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson discussed the Afghanistan situation with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday, when the two leaders agreed that the Group of Seven rich nations should take a common approach to dealing with any future Taliban government.

"The Prime Minister stressed that any recognition and engagement with the Taliban must be conditional on them allowing safe passage for those who want to leave the country and respecting human rights," Johnson's office said//CNA

Iraq's President Barham Salih and France's President Emmanuel Macron attend a news conference ahead of the Baghdad summit at the Green Zone in Baghdad, Iraq August 28, 2021. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani - 

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Saturday (Aug 28) France will keep troops in Iraq as part of anti-terrorism operations for as long as the Iraqi government needs, whether or not the United States decides to withdraw.

Macron was speaking at a news conference in Baghdad where several Middle Eastern leaders were attending a summit.

Asked about evacuations of people from Afghanistan, Macron said there were preliminary discussions with the Taliban about humanitarian issues and who would help those who need protection. France said on Friday its evacuation operation had finished//CNA