Sept. 5 (UPI) -- A global funding shortfall is forcing the United Nations' World Food Program to drop 2 million people from assistance in Afghanistan on top of the 8 million the organization stopped helping earlier, the program said Tuesday.
The program's officials in Afghanistan said it can only give emergency aid to 3 million people per month.
"Amid already worrying levels of hunger and malnutrition, we are obliged to choose between the hungry and the starving, leaving millions of families scrambling for their next meal," Hsiao-Wei Lee, the WFP's Afghanistan director and representative, said in a statement.
"With the few resources we have left, we are not able to serve all those people teetering on the edge of utter destitution."
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The program started rolling back support in March, saying then it could only serve 50% of its residents in need, down from 75%.
It said the program requires $1 billion to reach a planned 21 million people.
"In April and May, it was forced to cut off 8 million people from food assistance," the program said. "WFP is often the last lifeline for women, who are increasingly being pushed out of society, with dwindling options for making a living and feeding their children.
"These cuts mean that 1.4 million new and expecting mothers and their children are no longer receiving specialized food designed to prevent malnutrition."
Human rights watchers have said women's rights have been severely curtailed by the Taliban after taking control of the country two years ago, complicating the food situation.
This year the Taliban ordered all beauty parlors to close and barred women from taking medical school exit examinations or working at non-government aid organizations. In December, they banned women from attending universities.
