Aid needs grow in Somalia but access gets harder
LONDON, June 29 (Reuters) - Murders of aid workers, pirate attacks, closed borders and growing violence make the distribution of relief in Somalia almost impossible, aid workers say, as conflict and drought boost needs still further.
A Somali nurse for a Western aid group and his driver were shot dead late on Wednesday, while the United Nations says nearly 5,000 tonnes of food aid are blocked at the Kenyan border and food handouts in the Somali capital Mogadishu have been on hold since a Somali soldier opened fire on a crowd clamouring for food, killing three people.
Offshore, pirate attacks have deterred all but the hardiest shippers from delivering aid, slashing by 50 percent the amount the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) can bring in by sea.
"We are blocked from getting aid in from Kenya, we cannot distribute in Mogadishu and we have the pirates at sea," said WFP spokesman Peter Smerdon. "Even for Somalia, it's a grim picture."
More than 300,000 Mogadishu residents remain outside the city after fleeing fighting. Some are being housed by friends and relatives but others have sought shelter under trees.
The WFP fears even more will need support as crop failure is feared in the centre and south of the country after rains failed. It is assessing the effects of a reported locust plague in the country's north.
The agency says security concerns prompted the Kenyan government to block access to U.N. trucks trying to deliver food to 108,000 people inside nearby areas of Somalia. The trucks have been withdrawn and the food placed in storage.
"If they don't get food by the end of the month, undoubtedly malnutrition will rise," Smerdon said.
PIRATE MOTHERSHIP
The WFP wants international action to halt pirate attacks on shipping but says little has been forthcoming. Some attacks have taken place up to 200 nautical miles offshore, prompting talk of a shadowy unseen mother ship launching attackers in speedboats.
On Friday, a South Korean cargo ship carrying cereals was reported missing in pirate-infested waters off Somalia.
A day earlier, the International Maritime Organisation, the world's top maritime body, said it had asked the U.N. Security Council to help stamp out pirate attacks in the region.
Somalia has long been one of the most difficult countries in the world for aid workers since even before failed U.S. and U.N. peacekeeping missions in the 1990s.
Fighting flared anew after military intervention by Ethiopia and a fledgling African Union peacekeeping operation is seen as having little hope of stopping the violence.
The U.S.-based International Medical Corps said Wednesday night's attack on its staff, in which a driver and a nurse were killed, appeared to be linked to clan rivalry in the area. Security experts say attacks are almost impossible to stop.
"Just when you think it can't get any worse, it does," Nick Downie, global security head for Save the Children U.K., told Reuters. "Aid agencies keep on trying and they keep on paying dearly. The only thing that is predictable about Somalia is the unpredictability."
(For more information about emergency relief visit Reuters AlertNet: www.alertnet.org; e-mail: alertnet@reuters.com; tel: +44 207 542 5791)
