Day: July 23, 2021

GENEVA – The World Food Program is renewing its appeal for unimpeded access to Ethiopia’s northern province of Tigray, where an estimated four million people are suffering from acute hunger.

In a rare bit of good news, the World Food Program says the U.N. Humanitarian Air Service has transported 30 aid workers and urgently needed relief supplies for distribution across Tigray into Mekelle, the provincial capital.

The plane, which arrived Thursday, is the first passenger flight into the region in nearly a month. Commercial flights to Tigray stopped June 23. That was several days before Ethiopian authorities declared a unilateral cease-fire after eight months of deadly warfare. Tigray fighters quickly seized Mekelle and took control of the airport.

WFP spokesman Tomson Phiri says his agency, which manages the U.N. humanitarian air service, plans to operate twice weekly scheduled flights. That, he says will facilitate the regular movement of humanitarian personnel and light cargo into and out of Tigray.

“Now, whilst this is positive news, we also have some not so positive news,” said Phiri. “The World Food Program is extremely concerned as the humanitarian response in the region continues to be challenged by a severe lack of sufficient food and other humanitarian supplies, limited communication services and no commercial supply chain.”

Despite the challenges, the WFP has managed to deliver food aid to more than 730,000 people in parts of the south and northwest in the past month. Phiri says the WFP hopes to reach an additional 80,000 people in the northwest in coming days.

While that is commendable, he says faster, free, and unimpeded access is needed to reach millions of Tigrayans with life-saving food. He notes a U.N. food security analysis in June projected more than 400,000 people would be suffering from catastrophic levels of hunger starting in July.

“This is a conflict that is just over eight months old now. And people have not harvested,” said Phiri. “The majority also failed to plant. They have no food left. Their grain stocks were looted. Others were displaced. Some even multiple times. And they are in bad shape and our teams are telling me that the situation is quite dire. You expect malnutrition rates to be quite high.”

Phiri says the WFP aims to assist 2.1 million people at risk in Tigray. In the meantime, he says another WFP-led convoy of over 200 trucks carrying food and other essential supplies is on standby in Semera, the capital of the neighboring Afar region.

The WFP suspended aid deliveries along the Afar route after its convoy was attacked Sunday. Phiri says the trucks are expected to depart for Tigray as soon as security is assured.

Source: Voice of America

GENEVA – The U.N. refugee agency on Friday called for concerted action to help record-breaking numbers of people forced to flee increasingly violent armed attacks in Burkina Faso.

The attacks on civilians and security forces by jihadist groups are increasing in frequency and in the level of violence. Over the past two years, more than 1.3 million people, or 6 percent of the population, have become displaced inside the country.

UNHCR spokesman Babar Baloch said the speed of internal displacement was showing no sign of slowing as armed attacks continue unabated.

“In the first half of this year,” Baloch said, “some 240,000 people fled their homes to other parts of Burkina Faso, a sharp increase compared to nearly 100,000 registered during the last six months of the year 2020.”

The UNHCR said there had been an equally alarming increase in the number of people fleeing across Burkina Faso’s borders in search of asylum. It said more than 17,500 people had fled to neighboring countries in the first half of this year.

Most have fled to Mali and Niger. However, the agency noted some refugees had fled to Mauritania and Chad, and that more risked spilling over to Benin, Ivory Coast, Ghana and Togo, widening the impact of the regional displacement crisis.

Peace in Central Sahel

Baloch said a mechanism must be found to bring peace and security to Burkina Faso and to the neighboring Central Sahel countries.

“These countries, which are struggling, they may need support from other countries in the region or beyond,” Baloch said. “But what is also important is trying to take care of this displaced population. … So the call is for security in the region but also for resources, which help us to take care of this desperate population.”

The UNHCR said more money was required to meet the growing humanitarian needs in the region. It appealed for greater support from the international community. It noted that only half of the $259.3 million it requested had been received.

Source: Voice of America

ABOARD US MILITARY AIRCRAFT – The United States is again targeting fighters with the al-Qaida-affiliated al-Shabab terror group in Somalia, launching its second airstrike in the past four days following a nearly six-month hiatus that began when President Joe Biden took office.

The strike, by U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), appears to be part of an effort to lend U.S. airpower to what has been described as a fierce struggle on the ground between the Somali military and al-Shabab in Galmudug state, the same region targeted in Tuesday’s airstrike.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby told VOA and other reporters traveling aboard a U.S. military aircraft with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin that Friday’s strike was carried out in support of Somali forces near the village of Qeycad. He said the strike was permitted by the powers granted by the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force.

Kirby added that just as with the earlier airstrike, U.S. troops were not on the ground with Somali forces but were conducting a remote advise-and-assist mission. Further information was not provided because of “operational security.”

Al-Shabab is ‘no match’

A statement issued earlier Friday by the Somali government said the precision airstrike “destroyed al-Shabab fighters and weapons with zero civilian casualties.”

“Al-Shabab’s tactics are no match for the Danab [Somali special forces] and its partners,” the statement added, further describing the strike as having a “crippling” impact on the al-Shabab fighters.

The resumption of U.S. airstrikes against al-Shabab comes as military and intelligence officials in the U.S. and around the world warn of a growing threat from the al-Qaida-linked group.

Late last month, AFRICOM Commander General Stephen Townsend told a virtual defense forum that the spread of terrorism “has continued relatively unabated” across Africa, and he singled out al-Shabab as a major concern.

“We see threats in Somalia to regional stability,” he said. “We even see threats there to the U.S. homeland.”

Security vacuum?

Those concerns are being echoed by intelligence agencies from other countries and U.N. monitors, who warned in a report released Friday that al-Shabab has been successfully exploiting a security vacuum created by the departure of U.S. troops and a partial drawdown of the African Union Mission in Somalia.

In central and southern parts of the country, al-Shabab has “encountered little resistance in capturing several towns … in areas that had previously been hostile,” the report said.

The intelligence from U.N. member states also warned that al-Shabab, already able to boast having 10,000 fighters under its command, is gaining more advanced military capabilities.

The group “has significantly increased its use of drones to conduct reconnaissance flyovers and record the activities of security forces,” the report said, warning that al-Shabab may soon start weaponizing the drones as well.

Some intelligence agencies voiced fears that the drones could be used to supplement al-Shabab’s portable air defense systems in potential attacks on low-flying aircraft and aviation infrastructure along the border with Kenya. The area has served as a critical corridor for humanitarian flights and commercial aircraft.

Earlier this year, some Somalis voiced concerns that the pause in U.S. airstrikes was serving to embolden al-Shabab, allowing key leaders to come out of hiding and their fighters to mass in larger numbers without fear.

US airstrikes

The U.S. carried out 63 airstrikes against al-Shabab in 2019 and 53 airstrikes in 2020.

Another seven airstrikes were launched in the first 2½ weeks of 2021, before former U.S. President Donald Trump left office.

Not everyone, however, is convinced that the previous pace of U.S. airstrikes has made much of a difference.

Stephen Schwartz, the U.S. ambassador to Somalia from 2016 to 2017, told VOA that airstrikes against al-Shabab and the Islamic State group have “limited or modest value” in the overall fight against extremists, but they are extremely useful “in keeping al-Shabab on its back foot.”

“With no airstrikes for months and months, I would imagine al-Shabab is more relaxed, but also more able to do the things they couldn’t, whether it’s mobility, training more in the open, just lots of things that could make them more effective,” Schwartz said.

Some Somali military officers have also expressed concerns, telling VOA that while airstrikes can be helpful, they need additional support, including better weaponry and supplies to fight al-Shabab on the ground.

Statistics compiled by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a U.S.-based nonprofit research group, suggested that the danger to civilians in Somalia from al-Shabab actually decreased in the absence of airstrikes.

ACLED said it found 155 incidents in which al-Shabab targeted civilians in the six months before Biden took office, and just 90 in the six months after he became president.

Source: Voice of America