GENEVA — Major countries, with the United States notably absent, met Saturday in Switzerland with representatives of aid agencies and Iraq's neighbors to prepare for the relief work that will be needed if there is a war.
Neutral Switzerland invited 30 countries to take part in the closed-door meeting here.
Four of the five permanent U.N. Security Council members -- Britain, France, Russia and China -- are attending the two-day conference, which ends today. The fifth member, the U.S., refused to attend, saying U.N. agencies have already made extensive preparations.
Aid officials, however, noted that it was the first time Iraq's neighbors had met with relief agencies and wealthy donor countries to discuss what to do if war breaks out.
"It's certainly useful to have a lot of the players in the humanitarian situation together, completely outside the political environment, particularly the countries who would face a first wave of refugees," said Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.
Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey warned that a humanitarian crisis is almost certain if war is launched.
"The situation in Iraq is difficult. The sanitary infrastructures and supplies of drinking water are already insufficient," she said. "The resistance of the Iraqi people is very low and the risk of a massive humanitarian crisis correspondingly high."
Shaher Bak, Jordan's minister of state for foreign affairs, told reporters after Saturday's session that Iraq's neighbors would need more help than they received from the international community during the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
"We don't want a repeat of what we had to do in 1991 without any help from the international community," he said. Jordan, which depends on Iraq for its crude oil and fuel, fears worsening economic conditions and an influx of refugees.
In 1991, Jordan accepted 1.2 million refugees from Iraq. It has said it will not accept war refugees this time, except those in transit, although aid officials said Friday that the country had agreed to set up two refugee camps on its eastern border.
Ozbek Saran, vice president of the Turkish Red Crescent Society, said his country also was readying for a massive influx. "Right now our capacity would be 80,000, but of course in 1991 we had about 500,000. We have taken necessary measures to cope with 200,000, or maybe more," he said.
