Day: June 26, 2021

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UN: Madagascar Droughts Push 400,000 Toward Starvation

The U.N. World Food Program says southern Madagascar is in the throes of back-to-back droughts that are pushing 400,000 people toward starvation and have already caused deaths from severe hunger.

Lola Castro, WFP's regional director in southern Africa, told a news conference Friday that she witnessed "a very dramatic and desperate situation" during her recent visit with WFP chief David Beasley to the Indian Ocean island nation of 26 million people.

Hundreds of adults and children were "wasted," and hundreds of kids were skin and bones and receiving nutritional support, she said.

In 28 years working for WFP on four continents, Castro said she had "never seen anything this bad" except in 1998 in Bahr el-Gazal in what is now South Sudan.

The U.N. and Madagascar's government are launching an appeal for about $155 million in a few days to provide lifesaving food and prevent a major famine, she said. Thousands of people have left their homes in rural areas and moved to more urban environments in search of food, she added.

Beasley tweeted Friday that 400,000 people are "marching towards starvation," 14,000 are "in famine-like conditions," and "if we do not act ASAP, the number of people facing starvation will reach 500,000 in a few short months."

"Families have been living on raw red cactus fruits, wild leaves and locusts for months now," he said Wednesday.

"This is not because of war or conflict, this is because of climate change," Beasley stressed. "This is an area of the world that has contributed nothing to climate change, but now, they're the ones paying the highest price."

According to WFP, 1.14 million people in southern Madagascar don't have enough food including 14,000 in "catastrophic" conditions, and this will double to 28,000 by October.

Madagascar is the only country that isn't in conflict but still has people facing "Famine-Humanitarian Catastrophe" in the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification known as the IPC, which is a global partnership of 15 U.N. agencies and international humanitarian organizations that uses five categories to measure food security, Castro said.

Source: Voice of America

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Somalia Executes Militants Amid Deadly Attack

Security officials in Somalia say dozens of people were killed after militants attacked a small town in the central state of Galmudug early on Sunday.

At least 30 people were killed, among them civilian residents caught in the crossfire between militants and security forces in the town of Wisil, local officials told VOA Somali.

The attack started with the militants detonating a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device in an area close to a security camp in the town, said a regional official who asked not to be named because he is not allowed to speak to the media.

Galmudug’s information minister, Ahmed Shire Falagle, told VOA Somali that regional forces repulsed the dawn attack and inflicted losses on the militants. Falagle said three soldiers were among the dead with at least seven others injured. He said about 100 militants attacked the town and that “many of them have not returned alive.” He did not elaborate.

For its part, the al-Shabab militant group claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it killed 34 members of the security forces.

Wisil lies 200 kilometers southeast of Galkayo in an area where al-Shabab recently made advances. In April, the group captured the town of Ba’adweyne, not far from Wisil, after government and regional forces vacated it for undisclosed reasons.

About two hours after the attack in Wisil, authorities in the regional state of Puntland executed 21 men accused of al-Shabab membership and terrorism, regional police commander Colonel Mumin Abdi Shire told the media.

The men were convicted in separate trials in the towns of Galkayo, Garowe and Qardho this year.

Eighteen of the men were lined up next to a sand hill outside the town of Galkayo. Security forces facing them opened fire, executing them. Separately, three other men were executed in Garowe and Qardho town. All of the executions were by firing squad. It is the largest single execution of al-Shabab militants in Somalia, observers say.

Security officials in Puntland accused the men of involvement in a series of assassinations and attacks, spanning more than 10 years, which claimed the lives of regional and community leaders, security officers and journalists.

Al-Shabab is largely active in south-central Somalia. The group also has a small footprint in Puntland in the northeast. Puntland is a semi-autonomous state.

Source: Voice of America