US says it destroyed 500 metric tons of expired food aid but it won’t affect future distribution

Washington – The Ministry of Foreign Affairs says that its destruction of 500 metric tons of emergency food aid that was stored in a warehouse in the Middle East was required because it was expired and that the move will not affect the distribution of similar aid to move forward.

High -energy biscuits – used primarily to provide immediate nutritional needs for children in crisis cases – in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to respond to emergency situations and can no longer be safely sent to potential beneficiaries, so they were destroyed.

The case, which was reported by the Atlantic Ocean for the first time, has been repeatedly raised in Congress hearings this week, as Democratic lawmakers of the Trump administration accused the crisis and ignoring urgent humanitarian needs by suspending most of its first month’s foreign assistance in his position.

The administration has already dismantled the United States Agency for International Development, the country’s main agency to distribute food aid abroad, and is currently trying to cancel billions of dollars from foreign assistance. 319 million people around the world face sharp hunger, and people in places like Gaza, Sudan, South Sudan, Mali and Haiti swinging the brink of hunger, according to the United Nations World Food Program.

Bruce said that the destroyed amount was less than 1 % of 1 million metric tons of food aid provided by the United States every year and suggested replacing the devastating stock. But it could not say whether the Trump administration would continue to save one million metric tons to move forward.

“If something expires, we will destroy it,” Bruce said. “It is a matter of whether it is safe to distribute it or not.”

Bruce said that the destruction of expired, expired foods – which are generally stored in warehouses near the regions or countries at risk of drought, famine and other disasters – were not unprecedented and occurred in light of previous departments that did not follow the Drakone discounts in external assistance.

The major Democrat for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Jane Shaheen, a deputy foreign minister for administration Michael Regas on Wednesday about the destruction of food.

Senator New Hampshire obtained a commitment from Rigas to produce stocks of current food aid stocks and pledged the administration to try to distribute warehouse assistance before its expiration.

Shaheen said: “If the Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not have officials to distribute it, let us offer it to other relief institutions so that they can distribute them, so they will not be lost and that people benefit not only what American taxpayers pay, but people who are really desperate.”

She noted that there are stocks of cooking oil sitting in the port of Houston and dining aid stored in Djibouti, which may expire soon.

Rigas said that the intention of the administration was not allowing food aid intentionally ending and going to it.