(Image source: Al Jazeera)
BY TRACY PFEIFFER
ANCHOR MEGAN MURPHY
You're watching multisource world news analysis from Newsy.
The U.N. has acknowledged famine in southern Somalia.
And that’s just part of the problem.
The entire Horn of Africa is suffering a devastating drought.
Millions are suffering starvation in Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Eritrea.
Thousands are fleeing their homes to emergency refugee camps.
And reports say -- it’s going from bad, to worse.
Somali refugees in Mogadishu tell Al Jazeera...
MAN: “I used to own 48 cattle. Today, I have nothing. Everything’s gone. I brought my sick children and came to this camp but we haven’t received any sort of meaningful help.”
WOMAN: “I haven’t received any aid since I arrived at this camp. I don’t even go to the food distribution center anymore because it’s so crowded and people fight in the queues. We are in desperate need of help, and quick help.”
Aid organization Oxfam says it’ll take $1 billion to get the region through the drought.
The UN’s World Food program is calling for $360 million in urgent aid.
The UN will begin airlifting food into the region, and pledged nearly $14 million in emergency funds for Kenya. (Video: CNN)
All of this, amidst concern the aid won’t actually reach those who need it.
In Somalia, the U.S.-designated terrorist group al Shabab controls much of the country.
It has banned all foreign aid.
One aid worker tells CNN -- terrorists are partly to blame for the crisis.
RAJV SHAH, CHIEF ADMINISTRATOR USAID: “It’s no coincidence that the precise geographies that have been labeled a ‘famine’ and have met the technical determination of famine are precisely those areas where Shabab has limited access, has harassed aid workers.”
A columnist for Gulf News says -- the international community should have seen this coming -- and done something about it.
“This is an entirely predictable, traditional, man-made disaster, with little new about it except the numbers of people on the move and perhaps the numbers of children dying near the cameras. The 10 million people who the governments warn are at risk of famine this year are the same 10 million who have clung on in the region through the last four droughts and were mostly being kept alive by feeding programmes.”
Finally, an opinion writer for Ireland’s Independent says -- the world should be wary of throwing money at the region and then forgetting about it again.
“Somalians need food and water right now, but what they need in the long term is the same as the rest of us: functioning market economies based on democracy and the rule of law, where they have trade and industry rather than tents and food parcels.”
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