Aid agencies in race against Afghan weather

International aid agencies are racing against winter weather to get food, blankets and other supplies into Afghanistan.

The World Food Programme hopes to restore regular operations in Mazar-e-Sharif very soon.

The agency also says it has launched its first humanitarian airlifts from Tajikistan.

"Time is ticking, winter has started, and we need to get this food as quickly as possible into the less accessible regions," said Bukhard Oberle, country director of the UN's World Food Programme.

In western Afghanistan, Iran's Red Crescent Society has begun distributing food and blankets to 1,255 displaced Afghan families living in two overcrowded refugee camps near Herat.

Antonio Donini, deputy UN coordinator for Afghanistan, said he met General Rashid Dostum - one of the warlords who seized the city on November 9 - and received assurances international agencies could operate there safely.

"The authorities understand that the eyes of the world are on them," he said, adding that staff could return permanently to Mazar-e-Sharif within a week.

The uncertainty over the security situation in Mazar-e-Sharif and fighting in nearby Kunduz are also preventing the opening of the Friendship Bridge - the only crossing from Uzbekistan into Afghanistan over the Amu-Darya River.

Opening the bridge, which is near Termez, would allow aid supplies to be sent much more quickly to the 3.4 million people who need it in northern Afghanistan. UN aid currently arrives on barges, or via a much longer route through Turkmenistan.

In discussions with Uzbek officials, the UN has been told that a decision on the bridge is tied to both the situation in Kunduz and the question of who exactly controls Mazar-e-Sharif. Numerous international officials have expressed the wish for the bridge to open soon.