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Friday, February 13th,
2009 More than three million people in Somalia, a third or more of the
total population, will remain dependent on humanitarian assistance this
year, according to a United Nations analysis.
So far this year, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) has handed out
34,000 tons of food to some 3.4 million people every month, according to
the assessment by the UN Food Security Analysis Unit (FSAU) on the
strife-torn country, which has been riven by factional fighting and has
not had a functioning central government since 1991.
There is new hope amid the recent election of the new President, Sheikh
Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, who is expected to appoint a prime minister and
form a government of national unity in the coming days, in a bid to
bring stability to the country.
The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), for its part, is working to create a
permanent sustainable water system. UNICEF and the UN World Health
Organization (WHO) are helping to protect some 1.5 million children aged
five and under against preventable and water-borne diseases.
Meanwhile, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
has reported that only 18 per cent of funds needed for humanitarian work
in the Horn of Africa country has been disbursed.
Providing consistent aid to Somalia will remain a major challenge, a
situation certain to worsen now that the European Commission has pulled
out from among the top donors, it added.
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