Kosovo response has touch of Albany

So says an Albany native who works for Catholic Relief Services (CRS), the official overseas aid and development agency of U.S. Catholics.

Michael Wiest, who is now deputy executive director of policy and strategic issues for CRS, attended St. Pius X School in Loudonville and Christian Brothers Academy in Albany. (He still has family in the Albany Diocese: His mother lives at Teresian House Nursing Home in Albany, and his brother is Albany County chief assistant district attorney Lawrence Wiest.)

'Terrible' crisis

"The situation differs from location to location: Kosovo, Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Serbia proper," he said. "It's obviously a terrible situation in all the locations. The most worrisome is the situation within Kosovo; no one knows the numbers [of displaced persons] or how to assist them. The United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross are trying to send in people."

He estimated that 600,000-700,000 people have been displaced from their homes, and noted that "the nutritional situation could be very bad. Within Kosovo, we are unable to provide assistance. The structures have all been destroyed -- church structures, private agencies. People are either refugees or have been internally displaced or killed."

Fortunately, he said, CRS already had offices and warehouses established around Kosovo before the crisis began, so the organization had an edge over other agencies "that had to come to town and find office space, staff, places to live."

Mr. Wiest criticized what he termed the U.N.'s "dysfunctional" handling of organizing the many international aid efforts. "They didn't provide effective coordination," he stated. "They were slow in responding to the emergency."

Millions in aid

"We've been getting increasingly good support from our Catholic constituency, including in Albany," he noted. But "the situation is a big one, so the needs are really huge and will be ongoing."

CRS has been responding to those needs by sending staples ranging from potatoes and salt to soap and toothpaste. Aside from food, clothing, sanitary items and trauma counseling, Mr. Wiest said that one critical need is communication: Those in refugee camps, for example, may want to contact a relative in Sweden to see if other family members have checked in with that person. CRS is providing seven minutes of calling time per refugee family.

Moving refugees

"We're trying to encourage more people to go to Turkey," he said. One idea, not yet accepted, is to build a land bridge between Macedonia and Turkey for the refugees to cross.

"The Bosnia experience has made assistance agencies more able to deal with this problem; but when you have people living in tents, there's no terrific solution," he stated.

Seeking solutions

"No amount of aid is an ultimate solution to any of these problems," he added. "These people have been forced out of their homes; they've seen loved ones killed; they're guests in countries that don't like them. No one can pretend they can see exactly how this situation will evolve."

However, he stressed that CRS' work is not just that of a secular aid agency. As an organization of the U.S. Catholic Conference (the public policy arm of the nation's bishops), CRS was among those lobbying to allow 20,000 Kosovar refugees to the U.S. and wants to continue to "be with them in their struggle" as much as providing aid.

"Our provision of humanitarian assistance should also be seen as an expression of solidarity," Mr. Wiest said. "They know people are with them in their suffering."

(Diocesan Catholic Charities will forward contributions for relief of the Kosovar refugees to CRS. Send donations to Catholic Charities, 40 N. Main Ave., Albany, NY 12203. Write "Kosovo" on the memo section of the check.)

(05-20-99) [[In-content Ad]]