Thousands flee drought and hunger in Somalia for Kenya
Raho Ali has just arrived from Somalia with
four of her children at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) transit area in Kenya's northern border town of Dadaab.
The 45-year-old mother of seven said the
biting drought in Somalia prompted her to flee and seek relief in Kenya. Three
of her children got lost following a gun attack on them while on the
treacherous journey and she has yet to locate them.
"On our way to Dadaab refugee
camp," she told VOA, "I met with different things. People were dying
of starvation and hunger. People were disappearing." She added that,
"I have even lost three of my children on the journey. I don't know where
they are."
Ali is among tens of thousands flocking to
Kenyan camps in a new wave of drought-driven refugees.
The Kenyan government put a ban on the
registration of new refugees in the northern border with Somalia, but the UNHCR
says it has profiled 80,000 new arrivals in the last few months. Relief
agencies say the influx is straining their capacity to help.
Guy Avognon, the head of the UNHCR in Dadaab,
said that the wave has "overstretched our work. It has overstretched our
resources, because for the moment, this is an operation that is not attracting
a lot of donor attention. So, we are providing the barest minimum of assistance
that we can."
Kongani Athanus, health manager for the
International Rescue Committee, agreed with him. He explained that, "This
population was not planned prior to, like, six-seven months ago. But we’ve seen
these cases increase recently, like the past three-four months."
With a fifth straight failed rainy season, it
is feared the drought crisis in the Horn of Africa will only worsen. And with
parts of Somalia approaching famine, more refugees are expected in the camps.
Humanitarian agencies say they are worried
about the dwindling attention from the international community on the crisis
and are appealing for more aid.
"We are making plans for more
arrivals," Avognon explained, "But we appeal to the international
community to really pay attention to this side of the world, because there
doesn’t seem to be much attention coming our way, probably out of other
priorities internationally, including Ukraine. We are feeling it as compared to
previous years and previous influxes and previous emergencies where we got more
attention than now."
For the thousands fleeing drought and hunger
across the border like Ali, their main goal is simply to get some food and
shelter.
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