Aid groups reach Gori in Georgia

Humanitarian aid is getting in to the beleaguered Georgian city of Gori, but Russia needs to open corridors to allow assessment teams and more supplies to get through, the head of USAID said Friday.

Henrietta Holsman Fore, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, said NGOs had managed to get into the city Thursday to hand out supplies that had been brought in to the country by her agency and the U.S. military.

"The distribution of food and hygiene kits went well _ that is just one day, but it's a step in the right direction," she said.

Still, she said USAID's own people needed to be allowed into the Russian-held area to increase the supplies, and also get their own picture of what the people need.

"We've been calling on the Russians for access," she said, adding that they had not yet received a reply.

"It is extremely important for humanitarian assistance and assessment teams to be able to get through _ if they can get through, they can save lives."

The United Nations says 158,000 Georgians have been displaced since fighting with Russia began Aug. 7 over Georgia's separatist province of South Ossetia.

About 80,000 displaced people are being housed in more than 600 centers in and around the capital, Tbilisi.

To date, more than US$11 million in aid has been flown in to Georgia, Fore said. Supplies include prepared meals, blankets, cots, mattresses and even portable showers.

Fore said the focus right now is on bringing in the supplies needed for the short-term, but that later the U.S. would be focusing on reconstruction and helping rebuild the damaged Georgian infrastructure.

"We intend to be here by your side for many years to come," she told a Georgian reporter.

Fore was on a two-day trip to Georgia with the head of U.S. European Command, U.S. Gen. John Craddock, who is also NATO's supreme allied commander for Europe.

The general talked with American flight crews and USAID workers at the Tbilisi airport, where the aid has been coming in on regular flights.

One issue brought up by USAID personnel on the ground was that they did not know exactly what supplies were being brought in on which plane _ making distribution more difficult to coordinate.

Craddock said he would make sure the problem was sorted out.