Department denies Katrina aid was not sent
Ireland has not sent any of the 30 soldiers it promised to help Katrina victims. Neither have the pledged supplies been sent. These include bundles of first-aid kits, pillows and blankets and 3,000 ready-to-eat meals. Crutches and wheelchairs were also promised.
Explaining the background to Ireland's promised help, a department spokesperson said: "Basically, it is still on offer - but it hasn't been requested by the US."
Recently, aid agency chief John O'Shea sparked fury when he said that America did not need Ireland's help.
Fine Gael Foreign Affairs spokesperson Bernard Allen accused the Government of playing to the gallery of populism with a kneejerk decision to offer aid without consultation.
"The affair demonstrates a lack of organisation within the department and by the minister," said Mr Allen. "It indicates that the US was self-sufficient and there was serious lack of communication between it and the Department of Foreign Affairs."
A spokesperson for the Army said the troops were brought together at The Curragh, issued with special kit and briefed on their mission. That was immediately after the Government committed them to the aid effort in New Orleans and other southern US towns stricken by the hurricane.
The men, specialists in logistics, water purification and engineering, prepared over three days and were then dispatched back to their units across Ireland when no direct request for them came from America. The spokesperson said: "There hasn't been a request from the Americans. It's unlikely our men will be going now, although they can be reassembled at short notice if the situation changes."
He added that 3,000 vacuum-packed meals intended for America are still stacked in McKee Barracks in Dublin.
He said: "They will not go to waste. Their sell-by date goes well into 2007."
The €1 million pledged by the Government is helping the Katrina relief effort. A department spokesperson said €700,000 had been passed on to the Red Cross. The rest was being distributed by the Irish embassy in Washington to community organisations.
The soldiers and supplies were pledged in response to an official request on September 4 for assistance from the US authorities to the EU.
Ireland's response to the EU coordinators was sent within 24 hours.
Now a renewal is expected of the controversy sparked by Mr O'Shea, head of GOAL, who accused the Government of double standards in its offer to send troops to New Orleans when it had turned down similar requests for disaster zones in poverty-stricken Third World countries.
