Saturday, July 30, 2011


Somali rebels allege famine claim an infidel hoax

By Herve Bar | AFP – 10 hrs ago
For Somalia's Al-Qaeda-linked rebels, the drought devastating parts of the country is being exploited by external enemies, claiming that local Muslims were adequately addressing the crisis.
The Al-Shebab insurgents have expelled several foreign aid groups from regions under their control since 2009 and reiterated recently that the ban was still in force after the United Nations declared famine in two regions they rule.
Shebab spokesman Sheikh Ali Mohamud Rage denied there was famine in the southern Somalia regions of Bakool and Lower Shabelle as declared by the UN, but admitted that there was drought.
In a speech to the rebel radio, Rage said local traders and other residents have been the main providers of help to the drought-hit population and that "God did not make them need an outside enemy or non-Muslims, the people in the country fed them very well."
"We need Muslim people to be aware that the external enemy especially non-Muslims have been thinking of a new strategy.
"The new strategy is to transport them abroad, especially in Christian countries like Ethiopia and Kenya, so that their faith can be destroyed and that they could be staff and soldiers for the Christians," Rage charged.
Thousands of Somalis have fled to neighbouring Ethiopia and Kenya to seek relief from the harsh drought that has affected some 12 million people across the Horn of Africa region.
Somalia is the worst hit country by the drought, with malnutrition rates in some regions reaching 50 percent, according to the UN, while nearly half of its 10 million people are in need of humanitarian aid.
The aid restriction by the hardline rebels, who control much of southern and central Somalia, has been singled out as having worsened the effects of the drought.
However, a handful of foreign aid groups were spared the ban and can operate in the militia-controlled regions but with limited scope.
"For the Shebab it means that if the bulk of aid comes from Somali communities, foreign aid cannot be rejected," according to Support Programme (NSP), an organisation which advises aid groups on the Somalia operation.
But the NSP warned that the authority granted by the Shebab to the few foreign aid groups can suddenly be reversed, so the UN and other relief organisations should be cautious about their public pronouncements.
Whether to accept or reject external help has also deepened traditional divisions between moderate and extremist Shebab elements, a Western observer told AFP.
Hardliners led by Shebab chief Ahmed Abdi Godane reject any kind of foreign aid, while the moderates who have strong clan links are more open to outside help.
After initially appealing in early July for help and pledging to allow aid in -- even from non-Muslims -- the Shebab later clarified that the previous ban on some foreign aid groups was still in place.
"It is possibly an illustration of internal dissension among the (Shebab) leadership," the NSP said.
"The announcement of a famine and the massive media reporting over the subject further raised internal discontent and prompted a rapid response," it added.
Forced to pull out of the Shebab-ruled regions in early 2010, the UN's World Food Programme has been distributing aid in Mogadishu and this week began airlifting supplies to feed malnourished children.
The UN children's fund UNICEF and the International Red Cross have on their part distributed aid to insurgent areas recently.
Battered by a relentless civil war since 1991, the plight of Somalis has often been referred to as the world's worst humanitarian crisis.
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Ethiopia land lease risks displacement: report

By Jenny Vaughan | AFP – 23 hrs ago
Ethiopia's leasing of vast swathes of arable land to foreign and state-owned firms risks adding to the millions of people already requiring food aid in the drought-struck region, a US based think-tank warned on Friday.
Some 200,000 people are at risk of being displaced from land-grabbing, with at least 350,000 hectares of land leased since 2008 in south-west Ethiopia alone, according to the Oakland Institute.
"The impact is going to be terrible, because we can't expect this kind of development to benefit the local population," said Oakland's policy director Frederic Mousseau.
An additional 90,000 hectares are marketed as "available" in the federal land bank, Mousseau said.
"They will be losing their livelihood, and just join the millions of people that are relying on food aid in Ethiopia," he said.
Driven by recent food, energy and climate crises, investors from richer nations have been acquiring rights to vast tracts of land in several African nations to meet demand for bio-fuels, crops and mining resources.
Ethiopia is among the Horn of Africa nations affected by extreme drought, that has left some 12 million people in danger of starvation and spurred a global fund-raising campaign.
Some 4.56 million people in Ethiopia are in need of emergency aid, according to the UN.
But the Ethiopian government spokesman Bereket Simon rejected the report.
"The allegations of land grabbing, I think the Ethiopian government is not operating in that fashion," Bereket said.
"It is a responsible government that knows what it is doing," he added.
Under Ethiopian law, pastoralists have the right not to be displaced from their own land and must be consulted when land is taken over.
Bereket said local groups will be compensated if they are displaced.
"According to the constitution, we provide adequate compensation as well as giving them jobs. We make sure their lives are not being hampered," he told AFP.
The report adds to warnings earlier this week by rights group Survival International, who accused authorities of intimidating local populations to leave their land.
"We've had reports of heavy handedness, and it's clear that the government is paving the way for these projects to take off," said spokeswoman Fiona Watson.
The group's findings were based on information from local sources and international workers in the region.
Land buyers in poorer nations come from countries like Britain, China, the Gulf states, Saudi Arabiaand South Korea, a World Bank report last year said.
On Thursday, Germany's Africa policy coordinator said the practice of buying up land in the Horn of Africa by foreign companies was contributing to the drought.
"This catastrophe is also man-made," Guenter Nooke said.
Ethiopia's south-west Omo region is the site of Africa's largest hydroelectric dam project Gibe II, which also threatens to displace communities when construction begins later this year.

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E.Africa faces famine, Eritrea suffers in silence

By LUC VAN KEMENADE - Associated Press | AP – 3 hrs ago
MAI-AINI, Ethiopia (AP) — Alem Teke watched her crops in Eritrea shrivel and die from drought. She braved landmines and escaped being raped by soldiers to save her children from starvation by fleeing across the border to a refugee camp in neighboring Ethiopia.
Alem, a farmer's wife, made it to the Mai-Aini refugee camp in Ethiopia. She was more fortunate than some of her friends who were raped. Like many people fleeing famine that has hit parts ofthe Horn of Africa, Alem has overcome the odds to escape hunger, but as the world focuses on famine in Somalia, Eritrea suffers in silence.
Eritrea, a nation of 5 million people that borders Sudan, Ethiopia and Djibouti, has also seen failed rains and widespread food shortages. But its autocratic government, which faces international sanctions, refuses to acknowledge a drought has swept its territory. Satellite images show that the Red Sea nation has been hit by drought conditions similar to those in Somalia, Ethiopia and Djibouti.
Nearly 1,000 Eritreans arrived at a refugee camp in northern Ethiopia in July alone, officials said.
Alem has also taken a dangerous political stand by fleeing to Eritrea's archenemy, Ethiopia. The two nations severed ties in 2000 after a brutal border war that killed more than 80,000 people.
To return to Eritrea would mean certain punishment. Alem said government officials took away the lion's share of last year's harvest. She said they promised to pay but didn't and she couldn't feed her five children anymore.
"It was a matter of life and death," said the 40-year-old. "The government bleeds us farmers dry to feed the army. My husband is enlisted and I haven't heard from him in years. I couldn't wait any longer, not while my children were starving."
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, Johnnie Carson, said last week that many of the Eritrean refugees crossing borders into Sudan and Ethiopia suffer from malnutrition. He urged the reclusive Eritrean regime, led by longtime President Isaias Afwerki, to address the hunger and work with humanitarian organizations to prevent catastrophe.
Over the last few years, more than 48,000 Eritreans — most of them young, educated men or soldiers who have deserted the army — have fled to Ethiopia. Some 1,000 Eritreans risk death each month by crossing the border. Among the refugees are large numbers of children sent by their parents to escape future military service.
Simon Girmaw, a protection officer for the U.N. refugee agency, said the influx of refugees usually slows dramatically during the rainy season, from mid-June to mid-September, because flowing rivers deny access and farmers are busy preparing for the harvest.
But this year, he said, refugees are able to cross the ankle-deep or dry rivers by foot at most places. And many farmers aren't waiting for rains to come this year. Berhane Hailu, who screens refugees for Ethiopia's refugee agency, said an increasing number of Eritreans mention lack of food as their reason for fleeing.
One of the refugees, who said he was a statistician at the country's agriculture ministry, said the nation's food supplies are exhausted. He asked to remain anonymous for fear his family would face reprisals — other refugees have cited examples of their families being fined or jailed after their flight — as he painted a picture of spiraling problems in the pariah nation.
The statistician said the government has now rationed each family to only 22 pounds (10 kilograms) of grain each month. He said authorities have run out of stock and are trying to import wheat from Sudan, paying with mining revenues, Eritrea's only source of income besides remittances from Eritreans living abroad.
Refugees from southern Eritrea said their families haven't been able to buy food from the government for the last three months and that food prices have spiraled.
Refugees said a goat is now selling for more than $200 and a cow nearly costs $1,000. Soldiers are paid about $30 a month.
And, the statistician said, rains have failed.
"If the rains continue to fail, large parts of the country could be hungry in October, when farmers are supposed to harvest most of the staple crops," the statistician said.
On top of those problems, the country doesn't receive foreign aid and is sanctioned by the U.N. because of human rights violations. It is also believed to support extremist groups, including Somalia's top militant group, the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab.
The U.N. World Food Program says it hasn't distributed any food in Eritrea since 2005, nor has it received requests for food assistance.
Farmer Bereket Zere braved landmines to walk for days across the border to Ethiopia.
If he returns, he faces certain punishment for skirting the military service that is required of all men and women.
"I realized there's no use in staying," said the 21-year-old. "I was waiting to be enlisted in the army, there was no work, and, even if rains come, there will be hardly any harvest this year."
Another refugee, teacher Gebrehiwot Zere, said the food problems were the last straw for him. He said he was already exhausted by economic hardship and the country's authoritarianism before he decided to take the journey that requires traveling by night, hiding in bushes during daytime, and creeping through hostile areas where soldiers have been instructed to shoot at anything that runs.
Some refugees have described crossing one of the minefields near the border, where the soldiers don't patrol, as the safest option.
"That's why most who make it are young and strong," Gebrehiwot said. "If the drought continues, young children and elderly will be in trouble: There is no escape for them."
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Friday, July 29, 2011

AU forces gain ground against Somali militants

By JASON STRAZIUSO - Associated PRess | AP – 2 hrs 1 min ago
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — African Union and Somali forces traded barrages of fire at a new front line in Mogadishu on Friday, as the AU troops gained new territory against insurgents who may try to disrupt food distributions to famine victims.
A battlefield commander, Col. Paul Lokech, told The Associated Press on a trip near the front line that a Pakistani fighter was commanding the al-Shabab troops that AU forces were battling nearby, and that the militants were "active." Al-Shabab counts hundreds of foreign fighters among its ranks. Speaking of the Pakistani, Lockech said: "Don't worry, I'll get him."
Mortar fire and guns rang out nearby, as the militants put up more resistance than the AU forces had expected.
"They're worried about the ground they've lost," Lokech said.
The African Union and Somali troops have been fighting a concerted offensive against al-Shabab all year, and have gained a large swath of new territory in Mogadishu. But the fight took on a new importance in recent days as tens of thousands of famine refugees began squatting in squalid, hunger-filled refugee camps here.
The drought and the famine it's caused in Somalia have affected more than 11 million people, including 2.2 million Somalis who live in al-Shabab controlled territory in south-central Somalia where aid groups can't deliver food.
A second U.N. plane landed in Mogadishu on Friday with more than 20 tons of nutritional supplements on board. A Kuwait Air Force transport plane also landed in the capital and offloaded sacks of food.
The World Food Program said with its second delivery Friday it has airlifted nearly 31 tons of ready-to-use food into Mogadishu. A WFP plane with 10 tons of peanut butter landed Wednesday in Mogadishu, the first of several planned airlifts in coming weeks.
The AU offensive that began Thursday has seen AU troops move up the east side of Mogadishu's largest market — Bakara. The troops now control three sides of the market — the west, south and east — and AU force spokesman Lt. Col. Paddy Ankunda said Friday that the gains mean that tactically speaking the AU essentially controls the market.
Forces are now moving toward the city's large sports stadium, from which al-Shabab fires artillery, Ankunda said.
Putting a face on the young conscripts that fight for ragtag force that is al-Shabab, three militant fighters surrendered to AU forces and were being questioned on Friday. The three are teenagers: ages 14, 15 and 17.
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East Africa famine: How to help

Tens of thousands of starving Somalis have flooded Mogadishu refugee camps in search of food as the nation fights East Africa's worst drought in 60 years and ruling militants who are blocking aid from western countries.

Yahoo! News spoke to a reporter who is in Somalia and has seen first-hand what it’s like in the refugee camps of the war-torn and famished country.

“There was no food, no help. There are kids dying left and right—I'm not exaggerating. They buried 12 on the day I visited,” said Jason Straziuso, a reporter for the Associated Press.

“The most touching thing so far has been when this small child waved at me yesterday. I stuck my head in her tent and she was lying, motionless, flies flying everywhere and she sort of stuck her head up and waved at me,” he said. “That put a lump in my throat because I don't know that she's going to get better, in fact I think she has a good chance of not getting better.”

African Union forces have launched an offensive to keep aid agencies safe as they bring food and supplies to the thousands of refugees in Mogadishu.

The International Medical Corps is working on relief for the famine in East Africa.
Click image for more photos. (Reuters/Thomas Mukoya)
Click image for more photos. (Reuters/Thomas Mukoya)
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Street battles in Somali capital amid famine help

By JASON STRAZIUSO - Associated Press | AP – 19 hrs ago
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — African Union troops fought house-to-house battles with militants Thursday to clear space for aid groups bringing in food supplies after intelligence reports showed insurgents reinforcing for a possible attack on squalid camps of famine refugees.
Heavy fighting erupted on the line of control between the government side and territory held by al-Shabab, Somalia's dominant militant group.
At least six people were killed. The AU troops also paid a heavy price, with one official saying 19 were wounded, and some of them were put on an ambulance jet bound for Kenya.
Somalia's famine is unfolding in the middle of a war zone, greatly complicating international efforts to prevent a wave of death. Some 2.2 million people live in an inaccessible famine zone controlled by the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab.
Thursday's house-to-house fighting was only 2½ miles (4 kilometers) from the nearest famine refugee camp, said Lt. Col. Paddy Ankunda, spokesman for the African Union peacekeeping force.
The offensive, he said, was to ensure the city streets are safe for aid groups to get humanitarian supplies to the more than 20,000 famine refugees that have arrived in Mogadishu this month alone.
"The agencies have been trying to deliver. Unfortunately, al-Shabab has been bent on ensuring this aid does not reach the people," Ankunda said. "This operation is about the delivery of humanitarian aid."
Al-Shabab's decision last week to rescind permission allowing aid groups to operate in areas under militant control has denied hundreds of thousands of Somalis access to food aid, he said.
Ankunda added that al-Shabab has sent 300 reinforcement fighters to Mogadishu in recent days.
Refugees have said militants already killed men who tried to flee famine-hit regions of Somalia with their families, saying it is better to starve than accept help from the West. African Union intelligence reports have indicated there could be attacks on Mogadishu's patchwork of ad-hoc refugee camps.
Thursday's battle was a "short, tactical offensive operation," Ankunda said.
"This action will further increase security ... and ensure that aid agencies can continue to operate to get vital supplies to internally displaced," he said.
Mogadishu resident Mohamed Hussein said al-Shabab fighters had withdrawn shortly after the offensive began.
"We have captured most of the bases we attacked ... and our troops are still chasing them," said Abdullahi Ali Anod, a Somali military commander.
Troops from the African Union Mission in Somalia, known as AMISOM, have been eroding al-Shabab's territory all year. Ankunda said the government now controls more than 60 percent of Mogadishu, up from around 40 percent at the beginning of the year.
AMISOM will keep humanitarian organizations informed of future operations to limit the impact on famine relief efforts, he said.
"AMISOM fully understands the need to restrain military operations while the aid agencies mount their humanitarian campaign. However, we are here to maintain stability in Mogadishu, and if we perceive a threat from the extremist insurgents, then it is our duty to protect and defend the most vulnerable from this threat," he said.
The World Food Program operations were being conducted normally, said spokeswoman Challiss McDonough.
"The airlift plans have not been affected at this point," she said. "Our humanitarian mission remains unaffected and unchanged."
Ali Muse, the head of Mogadishu's ambulance service, said his workers had collected the bodies of six dead and 20 wounded after Thursday's fighting.
A medical official at Mogadishu airport said wounded AU peacekeepers would be flown to Nairobi, the capital of neighboring Kenya, for treatment. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to talk with the press. An Associated Press reporter watched as three wounded soldiers were put in a small jet for the flight.
Ankunda said he could confirm only that two AU troops had been wounded.
The famine in the Horn of Africa threatens al-Shabab's hold on areas under its control, with the militants fearing that the disaster will drive away the people they tax and force into military service. The militants previously have blocked aid workers from helping those in need in Somalia, fearing that foreign assistance would undermine their control.
The WFP said Thursday it has a funding shortfall of $252 million for famine relief efforts in the Horn of Africa. The agency said it was encouraged by the response of some donor countries that have pledged $250 million to help.
The WFP estimates more than 11.3 million people need aid across drought-hit regions in East Africa. Most of those affected live in pastoral communities where herds have been wiped out because of a lack of water.
The drought has created a triangle of hunger where the borders of Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia meet. The U.N. believes tens of thousands already have died in Somalia in areas held by the Islamist rebels.
But the famine has particularly ravaged Somalia because many aid groups were banned from militant-controlled areas two years ago.
Somalia has been mired in conflict since 1991 when longtime dictator Siad Barre was overthrown by warlords who then turned on each other. Islamist militants led by al-Shabab are trying to overthrow the weak U.N.-backed government that is being propped up by about 9,000 AU peacekeepers from Uganda and Burundi.
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Thursday, July 28, 2011


Somalia: Tipping points in the first famine of the 21st century
22 Jul 2011

By Tristan Clements, World Vision Australia

Water remains a major problem for this community in Garowe in Somalia and is mentioned to World Vision staff during an assessment as one of the greatest needs.
Photo by Kevin Mackey.
©2011 World Vision International
We hear the word “famine” a lot, particularly in reference to Africa and food-related problems. In fact, the word is often overused.

Famine is a very specific event - a really, really terrible one - in which we see lots of people of all ages dying as a result of food shortages. For the United Nations, the word has a technical definition of two or more people out of 100,000 dying each day, and acute malnutrition among a third of young children.

In reality, famines don’t happen much anymore. There were a handful in the late 20th century, most notably in Somalia, Ethiopia, and Sudan, but it’s been quite a long time since we’ve seen a real famine.

So it is with great significance that the United Nations is now using the word “famine” to describe the situation in parts of East Africa.

What we are more accustomed to seeing are food crises and nutrition crises. These are periods of either food shortage (low volume of food available) or malnutrition (poor nutritional intake), which are often - but not always - related. Drought tends to cause food shortages. This will often result in malnutrition in some (but not necessarily all) parts of a population. Those most at risk of malnutrition include children and infants, pregnant and nursing mothers, the elderly, and those who have chronic sickness, particularly but not exclusively HIV and AIDS. Malnutrition, however, can also result from poor feeding practices, disease epidemics, and other factors that are compounded by but not necessarily caused by food shortages.

Malnutrition kills, but most of the time it kills only the vulnerable, and most notably, young children. On its own, malnutrition is rarely the cause of death, but it makes children vulnerable to diseases such as malaria, measles, diarrhoeal disease or chest infections. Disease and malnutrition then interact in a vicious cycle such that as children get sick, they are less able to absorb essential nutrients, and therefore get weaker and more susceptible to the illness.

It is among young children (under the age of 5) that we see the earliest casualties in a food and nutrition crisis, but the death of children by malnutrition does not in itself constitute a famine. Rather, as was seen in Niger in 2005 and 2010, it causes a nutrition crisis.

This is also where we are at with much of the Horn of Africa right now. Children are dying, now. Emergency thresholds for malnutrition are internationally recognised as 15 percent of a population of children being acutely malnourished. In some parts of the Somali population, as many as 30 percent of children are malnourished. Fresh data from the UN suggests that we are now facing famine in parts of the region.

The failing rains (in some cases, for the third consecutive season) have caused crops to die, cattle to die, and people to flee their homes in search of food and water. This is coupled in Somalia with an ongoing civil war that is making access to and support for these populations very difficult. Many are congregating in overcrowded relief camps, where they are more susceptible to the spread of disease.

All of this means that while we’re not technically looking at a “famine” across the entire region right now, we’re seeing food shortages and a malnutrition crisis that is extremely alarming, and which observers are now saying could be precursors to famine conditions. And in the worst-hit areas of southern Somalia, we have already reached the tipping point. Agencies like World Vision have been responding to this crisis in the Horn of Africa for many months — ever since it became clear that a crisis was building — and now, as the situation worsens, we continue to provide as much support as possible.
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New refugee camp still closed to starving Somali refugees as supply airlift to Mogadishu is postponed

Refugees who fled Somalia are being forced into an under-equipped camp in northern Kenya while another site ready to help them still lies unused.

New refugee camp still closed to starving Somali refugees as supply airlift to Mogadishu is postponed
Internally displaced Somali women receive food-aid rations at a distribution centre, in an IDP camp in the Somali capital Mogadishu Photo: AFP PHOTO/ ABDURASHID ABDULLE
Mike Pflanz
By , Nairobi
4:56PM BST 26 Jul 2011
Kenya's government and the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said last week that a centre with shelter, water, lavatories and other services would be opened to cope with the fresh influx.
But that Ifo 2 camp, at Dadaab, was being bypassed while more than 200 desperate Somali families a day were instead being moved "from one desert to another", aid workers said on Tuesday.
Alfred Mutua, spokesman for the Kenyan government said the camp should be happen by the end of Thursday.
But he reiterated that the UN should instead focus more on feeding Somalis in their own country.
An expected airlift of special food for children worst-affected by famine in Somalia was postponed on Tuesday after last-minute logistical delays, the UN's World Food Programme said.
More than 100,000 people have in the last two months fled rural areas of Somalia for the capital, despite there being very little international assistance available to them.
Fresh data due from other parts of the country is expected within weeks to show that the entire south of the world's most failed state has tipped from a humanitarian emergency into a famine.
International appeals totalling £1.2bn to provide food and help to more than 11.6 million hungry people across the Horn of Africa were still little over half funded, the UN said on Tuesday.
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