Drought solutions: Do deals with rebels

[NASSIR]

Drought solutions: Do deals

with rebels

 

UN refugee agency; 'Children are dying ... their mothers reduced to walking skeletons'

 

By MIKE PFLANZ and ZOE FLOOD, The Daily Telegraph

July 11, 2011

 

International aid agencies should make deals with Islamists linked to al-Qaida to deliver aid to starving millions in Somalia, the head of the UN's refugee agency has said.

 

The "absolutely appalling" suffering in Somalia meant talks must be opened with those involved to bring food to those who need it, says Antonio Guterres, the UN's high commissioner for refugees (UNHCR).

 

The drought has left as many as 12 million east Africans in need of urgent help, and is believed to have hit Somalia the hardest.

 

The UN'S refugee agency has issued an "urgent appeal" for $136.3 million for Somali refugees in neighbouring Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti.

 

The UNHCR said the funds are needed "to address the life-saving needs of up to 90,000 new arrivals in Ethiopia as well as ongoing arrivals in Djibouti and Kenya until the end of the year."

 

"Refugee children are dying and their mothers, reduced to walking skeletons, face the unbearable choice of which child to save first," said Guterres in an emailed statement.

 

Thousands are streaming towards the war-ravaged capital, Mogadishu, despite ongoing fighting between the government and the al-Shabaab group.

 

The insurgents, linked to al-Qaida, control almost all of Somalia's centre and south and have refused to allow foreigners to work in their territory.

 

However, last week al-Shabaab's spokesman said that they would be willing to allow in the aid agencies.

 

There are concerns, however, that trucking food and water into areas held by rebels would allow them to take control of handouts.

 

"The UN mission in Somalia is dealing with that, and trying to find a clear answer to the conditions that are necessary for assistance to be delivered in the areas controlled by the group," Guterres told the BBC.

 

"We have been insisting that we should do everything at the level of international community with all the actors involved in the conflict, to make it possible to deliver massive humanitarian assistance inside Somalia."

 

Several agencies have appealed for food, water, medicines and shelter.

 

The UN already has people on the ground in areas where the Islamists work, and was looking at how to expand their operations.

 

"Our staff are in touch with al-Shabaab at a local level, we now need to see what assurances and security guarantees they can give," Mark Bowden, the UN's humanitarian coordinator for Somalia said.

 

Alex Vines, head of the Africa Programme at the London think tank Chatham House, said the chance to use aid to open a working relationship with al-Shabaab outweighed the risk of some shipments going missing.

 

Source: The Daily Telegraph