WUNRN
SOMALIA - REBEL BAN ON AID INCREASES
FAMINE & HUNGER FOR WOMEN & CHILDREN
Women from sit in a line to receive aid at a refugee camp in Mogadishu, Somalia.
http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-202_162-10008673.html?tag=contentMain;contentBody
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http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/somali-exodus-likely-as-famine-aid-blocked
SOMALIA - FAMINE - REBEL GROUP BANS MAJOR AID AGENCIES - WOMEN
30 November 2011 - NAIROBI (AlertNet) – A new
exodus from famine-hit Somalia is likely following a ban by the al Shabaab
rebel group on several major aid agencies, experts said on Wednesday.
The United Nations warned that some regions could
tip back into famine because of the al Qaeda-affiliated militants’ Nov. 28 ban on 16 relief agencies
in areas they control. Four million people in Somalia are going hungry, with
250,000 experiencing famine.
“If the assistance is cut, they don’t have access
to food, to nutrition, to health, to water,” Philippe Royan, head of the
European Commission’s Humanitarian Aid Office (ECHO) for Somalia, told
AlertNet.
“It may trigger, again, a movement of people in
search of assistance where they can – Mogadishu, Ethiopia and Kenya.”
Kenya’s Dadaab refugee camp, the largest in the
world, is already in crisis, chronically overcrowded and partially flooded.
Many agencies have suspended work there following the kidnapping of two aid workers in October.
SERIOUS PROBLEM
The agencies banned by al Shabaab include the U.N.
children’s fund (UNICEF), the U.N. refugee agency (UNHCR) and the World Health
Organization (WHO), as well as non-governmental organisations.
Royan said ECHO’s partners are contacting the
rebel group to understand the implications of the ban.
One of the main concerns is whether the aid
pipeline, or transport system that large agencies use to deliver aid to
regional partners, will be cut.
For example, UNICEF transports its products for
malnourished children to a network of international and local NGOs who provide
emergency treatment to hundreds of thousands of children on the ground.
“If banning UNICEF means they don’t want to see
any UNICEF representative in Baidoa, but that we can still send the trucks
towards Baidoa to supply those local NGOs, then the impact would not be that
much,” said Royan.
“Does it mean that the pipeline of acute malnutrition
treatment products is cut? Then we would have a very serious problem.”
MOGADISHU INFLUX
Without access to aid, people may flee to
Mogadishu, the Somali capital where there are already almost 300 displaced
people’s settlements.
In October, 8,840 people arrived in Mogadishu,
according to UNHCR.
The majority were fleeing conflict in the Afgoye corridor, the world’s largest
displaced person’s settlement, 30 km outside Mogadishu. It is already a famine
zone, hosting 400,000 people.
“In Mogadishu, we have potentially this return
from people who are in the Afgoye corridor quite close to the city,” Royan
said.
“It will be difficult for the city, for the
partners, to absorb many more because of all the logistics constraints we have
working in a place like Mogadishu.”
He said some partners working in the Afgoye
corridor, such as Islamic Relief, have not been banned and ECHO will see if it
can help them to scale up their activities.
PERILOUS DESERT JOURNEY
Thousands of starving people have already died on
long-distance treks through the desert in search of help in neighbouring
countries. Over the last few months, the exodus has slowed as more aid has been
delivered inside Somalia.
“Recent military activity inside South Central
Somalia will make this last-resort journey even more perilous,” Kristalina
Georgieva, the European commissioner responsible for international
cooperation, humanitarian aid and civil response, said in a statement.
There has been an upsurge in violence since
Kenya’s invasion of Somalia six weeks ago, followed by an Ethiopian
incursion, both aimed at destroying al Shabaab.
Insecurity has prevented the distribution of
blankets and plastic sheeting to people in El Waq town in Gedo region on the
Kenya-Somalia border, who have lost their homes to floods, the United Nations'
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in its Nov. 29
update.
ONE MILLION FEWER FED
The number of people receiving food aid is likely
to be about one million fewer in November than October, when 2.6 million were
reached, OCHA said.
Between Nov. 1 and Nov. 28, only 1.5 million
people received food aid because of insecurity and trucks getting stuck on
muddy, rain-drenched roads.
Some deliveries are being re-routed via Ethiopia,
worsening delays and costs.
The International Committee of the Red Cross is
the main agency providing food aid in al Shabaab-controlled southern Somalia
because al Shabaab has banned the U.N. World Food Programme since February
2010.