UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres “sounded the alarm” and called for “massive international support” on Tuesday to help Somalia, threatened by a historic and potentially very deadly drought and weakened by an Islamist insurgency.
Mr. Guterres arrived in the morning in Mogadishu, capital of this country of the Horn of Africa, for a “solidarity visit” on the occasion of the month of Ramadan.
“I am also here to sound the alarm on the need for massive international support: massive international support because of the humanitarian challenges the country is facing, massive humanitarian support related to building security capacity in Somalia and massive humanitarian support for the stabilization and development of the country,” he said during a joint press conference with Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud.
The latter welcomed this visit, which “testifies that the United Nations is fully committed to supporting our plans for state building and stabilization of the country”.
The arrival of Mr. Guterres, who had already visited Somalia in March 2017, comes as the country faces a disastrous drought, the worst in four decades.
Five consecutive failed rainy seasons in parts of Somalia, as well as Kenya and Ethiopia, have wiped out livestock and crops and forced at least 1.7 million people from their homes in search of water and food.
According to a study published in March by the Somali Ministry of Health, the World Health Organization and the UN agency Unicef, between 18,100 and 34,200 people could die from the consequences of the drought in Somalia during the first six months of this year.
The UN has appealed for $2.6 billion in humanitarian aid for Somalia. The UN chief urged “donors and the international community to step up their support to urgently fund the 2023 Humanitarian Response Plan which is currently only 15% funded.”
About half of Somalia’s population will need humanitarian assistance this year, with 8.3 million people affected by drought, according to the United Nations.
Somalia was already hit by a famine in 2011 that killed 260,000 people, more than half of them children under the age of six. In 2017, a new disaster was averted thanks to the rapid mobilization of the international community.
Mr. Guterres must meet various political actors and also go to a camp for displaced people, according to local media.
The UN chief and the Somali president also “discussed the valuable efforts of the government to fight terrorism and advance peace and security for all”, he stressed. A reference to the fight led by the government, supported by the international community, against the radical Islamists shebab, a group affiliated with Al-Qaeda which has been leading a bloody insurgency since 2007.
Returning to power in May 2022, Hassan Cheikh Mohamoud declared “total war” on Shebab and sent troops in September to support local clan militias who rose up against them in the center of the country.
In recent months, the army and these militias known as “macawisley” have taken back large swathes of territory from Shebab, in an operation supported by the African Union force in Somalia (Atmis) and American airstrikes .
The government said at the end of March that more than 3,000 Shebab fighters had been killed since the start of the offensive. And according to the Ministry of Information, 70 towns and villages have been “liberated” from the rebels. This information is impossible to verify independently.
Despite these setbacks, Al-Shabaab have regularly carried out deadly attacks, underscoring their ability to strike at the heart of Somali cities and military installations against civilian, political and military targets despite government advances.
In a report to the UN Security Council in February, Antonio Guterres said 2022 had been the deadliest year for civilians in Somalia since 2017, largely due to Al-Shabaab attacks.
04/11/2023 15:04:50 – Mogadishu (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
