America and her allies could preside over the deaths from starvation of millions of people in Afghanistan unless it pauses its bombing campaign to allow a huge influx of food aid, United Nations Human Rights Commissioner Mrs Mary Robinson warned today.
She said helping Afghanistan's civilian population through the winter had to be a top priority.
Speaking from Geneva Mrs Robinson told BBC 1's Breakfast with Frost programme: "There is an urgent need to provide huge humanitarian relief.
"The World Food Programme calculates that it is necessary to get something like 56,000 tonnes of food into Afghanistan. There are a few convoys getting in ... but these are very little in the context of winter closing in on about the 15th or 16th of November. It is a very, very urgent situation."
She argued that there was a strong case for a pause in the allied airstrikes.
"It is very hard to get convoys of food in when there is a military campaign. Some of the roads are necessarily being damaged," she said.
Mrs Robinson continued: "I would be very pleased if there were to be a pause.
"Because that would allow the kind of very urgent and widespread humanitarian relief to go in to all parts of Afghanistan, and particularly the centre.
"It had been thought that a lot of refugees would come across the borders to Pakistan and Iran. But the borders are closed. So you have millions of people, they say up to seven million at risk. It is almost like a Rwanda-style problem.
"Are we going to preside over deaths from starvation of hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people this winter, because we didn't use the window of opportunity before winter closes? That is the problem."
Britain's International Development Secretary Ms Clare Short has defended the international community's food delivery efforts, and pointed out that Mrs Robinson's role is not directly connected to aid delivery.
But Mrs Robinson said: "The right to food, the right to shelter are basic human rights, part of securing the right to life."