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CNN Saturday Morning News

Bush to Oversee Aid Shipment to Afghanistan

Aired December 08, 2001 - 08:43   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JEANNE MESERVE, CNN ANCHOR: President Bush will spend part of his day helping the children of Afghanistan. Mr. Bush is in New Windsor, Maryland. He'll help oversee the first shipment of relief supplies for Afghan kids. Those supplies all paid for with money raised by American children.

CNN's Major Garrett is live from New Windsor with more on this -- Major.

MAJOR GARRETT, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Jeanne. Jeanne, let's cut to the chase. If you're a child in northern Afghanistan right now you're probably very, very hungry and very, very cold. Well, President Bush will be here in just a few minutes to supervise the first shipment of supplies that he hopes will alleviate some of that hunger and some of that cold for millions of Afghan children living in the northern part of that country.

Behind me you see boxes filled with supplies. What's in those boxes? Well, 1,500 tents -- and these are not small, little two- person pup tents -- these are tents that can hold up to 16 adults. They're winterized -- specially winterized tents to get the children through and their parents through the very desperately cold winter months in northern Afghanistan.

Also 1,600 winter jackets -- those especially for the children, and 10,000 gift boxes. In those gift boxes: wool hats, wool gloves, crayons, school supplies, toothbrushes, soap, candy and some toys -- all of it gifts from the American children.

On October 11, you may remember, the president asked children throughout America, "Send the White House $1 each." Well, so far $1 1/2 million have been raised to pay for these relief efforts -- the first of many, the president hopes. He encourages children to keep sending money to the White House because the needs in northern Afghanistan are so very great indeed -- Jeanne.

MESERVE: Major, how does the aid get from Maryland to the children who need it?

GARRETT: Five Federal Express trucks will soon be here, Jeanne. They will take all of these supplies to Dulles International Airport. From there they'll be flow to Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany. A Defense Department plane will then take them to Ashgabat, Turkmenistan. From there they will be trucked into the northern parts of Afghanistan -- two key provinces -- Faryab and Balkh. And from there they will be distributed by international relief organizations to refugee camps, and also cities where these children and their parents are shivering and very, very hungry in these winter months -- Jeanne.

MESERVE: Major Garrett in New Windsor, Maryland. Thank you.

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