Aid corridors should be opened into Afghanistan to enable humanitarian organisations deliver supplies, according to the relief and development agencies Tr≤caire, Concern and GOAL.
In a statement yesterday, Tr≤caire said the decision of the US and UK governments to commence military action against Afghanistan was highly regrettable: "It seems that political pressure in the US on the Bush administration has taken precedence over the humanitarian needs of millions of Afghan refugees and displaced people."
Concern has also expressed fears that "military action against Afghanistan could precipitate a massive humanitarian crisis, in a country already on the brink of famine".
The chief executive of GOAL, Mr John O'Shea, said: "This is potentially one of the biggest disasters since Rwanda or even Ethiopia."
Although information was scarce, there were said to be five or six million displaced people in Afghanistan and they needed a minimum of 50,000 tonnes of food per month.
With the start of bombing, the supplying of food by trucks had effectively stopped, Mr O'Shea said, but a trucking operation was "absolutely essential" in the present situation.
"There has got to be a corridor opened where food can flow in mass quantities on trucks, otherwise we are looking at a serious famine situation," he said.
Air drops were "better than nothing" but could six million people be fed from the air?
The Minister for Foreign Affairs should be applying pressure through the UN Security Council to get the borders with surrounding countries opened, Mr O'Shea said.
The Tr≤caire statement said the organisation had urged that all non-violent methods to resolve the crisis be exhausted before resorting to open warfare. "We are far from convinced that this has happened or that it was ever considered as a real option by the US-led coalition."
In the short term the outcome of the attacks would be to exacerbate an already appalling situation: "Hundreds of thousands of additional people will be displaced. The borders of Afghanistan remain closed as a result of requests from the US government to the neighbouring countries to ensure that the al-Qaeda do not escape.
"This situation is in breach of international conventions governing the position of refugees and of civilians in times of warfare," the Tr≤caire statement said.
Tr≤caire also described the linking of food-aid drops with military action as "very unhelpful" to the humanitarian effort.
Ultimately terrorism would not be defeated by military action, but rather by the application of law. "The UN Secretary General has called for the international community to use the conventions of the United Nations for the suppression of terrorism.
"As a member of, and current chair of, the Security Council it is Ireland's duty to promote to the fullest extent such an approach. Ireland should immediately ratify all of the outstanding UN conventions on terrorism and put before the Dβil the required legislation to recognise the international criminal court following the successful referendum earlier this year allowing this to happen," Tr≤caire said.
Concern said air drops should only be used when there was no other option. Aid corridors should be established by the international community and aid operations should be kept separate and distinct from military activity.