Post date: Jul 22, 2011 4:2:33 PM
Aid agencies warn the plight of famine victims in Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia is close to catastrophic.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND (JULY 22, 2011) (UNTV - Islamist rebels in Somalia -- who control the parts of the country where famine was declared this week -- have said aid agencies they expelled from those areas last year cannot return, reversing a previous pledge.
The al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab militants imposed a ban on food aid in 2010, which the U.N. and Washington say has worsened the crisis, before appearing to reverse it last week.
The U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) was among several groups ordered out of rebel areas which are now preparing to return, describing the situation in Somalia as increasingly desperate.
WFP spokesperson Emilia Casella on Friday (July 22) told a news conference at the UN offices in Geneva: "The situation is extremely dire. We're convinced that it is a lifesaving mission that we are obligated to undertake and therefore as soon as we receive the assurances that we will have security and the proper conditions of access we will be going back, and in fact we're already making those plans together with our partners."
The United Nations told Reuters it had not heard about any new position from the rebels and planned to take last week's pledge at face value and push ahead with food shipments by air and sea.
Al Shabaab had promised to allow relief agencies with "no hidden agendas" greater access to their territory.
Some 10 million people are affected by famine and drought in a region, dubbed the "triangle of death" by local media, that straddles Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia.
The UN told Reuters it had a "moral imperative" to get back into the areas from which it had been ordered out.
Melissa Fleming, UN commission for refugees chief spokesperson told journalists: "We are really trying our best to work inside Somalia so that people don't have to make this devastating, life threatening trek into Kenya and Ethiopia. If we could aid the victims on the spot, prevent them from leaving their villages, we would not be in this terrible situation we are seeing now.
"Many of the refugees are arriving in very bad shape, we're saying its close to catastrophic, our nutrition experts are calling it a dire nutritional emergency."
Al Shabaab accused the United Nations on Thursday (July 21) of exaggerating the severity of the drought gripping the south of the country and of politicising the humanitarian crisis.