Abdi Hajji Hussein : July 9, 2011
Some 100 children die of malnutrition in Somalia every day while 60,000 people are displaced inside the Horn of African nation daily, an official of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said Friday.
Abdi Yusuf Nur, an official from OCHA’s office of information, said in an interview with state-run Radio Mogadishu the drought situation is worsening day after day and has reached a very serious point.
“I am requesting local charity organizations who are involved in helping drought-hit people, Somali government and its people to work with international aid agencies and exchange drought-related information in a bid to facilitate helping those who are in dire need for emergency humanitarian aid,” Nur said.
He admitted that there are delays in humanitarian services, saying that the United Nations relief organization didn’t receive the needed funding to tackle this “unfolding drought catastrophe.”
Nonetheless, the official noted the aid agencies will begin providing assistance in Somalia as soon as possible.
Recently, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees launched an urgent appeal, telling the international media that a “human tragedy of unimaginable proportions” is about to unfold if more help is not provided.
Because of an extreme drought ravaging civil war-torn Somalia, as much as a quarter of the country’s population is now displaced or on the move, walking hundreds of miles to refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya.
The UN comments come as Mogadishu overflows with hundred of families who have been displaced from the southern Somalia region that is tightly controlled by the extremist militants of al Shabaab.
On Monday, at least 10 toddlers died of hunger and malnutrition in Mogadishu.
http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/90053808?UN%20official%3A%20100%20children%20die%20in%20Somalia%20daily#ixzz1SOItoMEG
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