The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Norwegian Refugee Council

  • Conflicts displaced 5.5m people in Africa – Norwegian Council

    The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC)’s Internal Displacement Monitoring Center (IDMC) said on 5.5 million people were internally displaced by conflict in sub-Saharan Africa in 2017.

    According to a study, the IDMC said Sub-Saharan Africa, a continent which only makes up 14 per cent of the world’s population, accounted for nearly half of the 11.8 million people displaced by conflict in 2017.

    The Global Report on Internal Displacement (GRID 2018) revealed that the Democratic Republic of the Congo was hardest hit, with almost 2.2 million new displacements, more than three worst-affected countries — South Sudan, Ethiopia and Central African Republic – which together accounted for 2.1 million.

    The Director of IDMC, Alexandra Bilak, said the scale of this displacement is dishearteningly familiar.

    “This report showed why we need a new approach to address the huge costs of internal displacement, not only to individuals, but also to the economy, stability and security of affected countries,” Bilak said.

    According to the report, almost 15,000 people a day fled within their own their countries to escape conflict and violence.

    “Internal displacement often heralds the start of broader crises. While we have seen some useful policy progress since the adoption of the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement 20 years ago, it is nowhere near enough to cope with, much less reduce, the scale of the problem,” he added.

    IDMC said the Boko Haram insurgency, ethnic violence and clashes over diminishing resources led to more than 415,000 new displacements in the Lake Chad Basin, 65 per cent of them in Nigeria’s North East states.

    NAN

  • Famine: Organisation calls for increased humanitarian aid for Somalia

    Famine: Organisation calls for increased humanitarian aid for Somalia

    An International charity organisation on Monday called on donors to increase humanitarian aid to help avert famine in Somalia where the lives of some 2.7 million people are at risk.

    In a statement issued on the eve of London for Somalia humanitarian conference, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) warned that half a million people today are on the brink of famine.

    “The international community saved thousands of lives in Somalia last year, and helped stop a famine before it could happen.

    “Less humanitarian aid now threatens to throw the country back into a deeper crisis, even towards catastrophe,” NRC Regional Director Nigel Tricks said in a statement.

    The focus of the High-Level Event for the Humanitarian Situation in Somalia is to draw attention to the humanitarian crisis in Somalia and generate political and financial momentum for the 2018 humanitarian response and recovery.

    The Tuesday event will bring together senior decision makers and partners to agree on how to plan and fund the 2018 humanitarian response, address priority gaps, review lessons from the successful 2017 famine prevention response and how these can be applied to best effect in 2018.

    According to the charity, while the country dodged famine in 2017, 2.7 million people today are living in what the UN describes as crisis or emergency phases of hunger.

    “Aid works, as humanitarian aid saved countless lives in Somalia in 2017, but 2018 promises a new year of crisis.

    “Somalia’s forecast includes continued drought for several regions this year,” Tricks said.

    Read Also: Two senior UN officials in Somalia to help tackle food insecurity

    “Without a focused effort by government and the international community to maintain support for Somalis at risk, thousands of people may be pushed back over the edge,” he warned.

    According to the charity, the humanitarian community seeks 1.5 billion U.S. dollars for programs to sustain and rebuild the drought and conflict stricken country in 2018 with focus on drought.

    A catastrophe was averted in 2017 as donors, governments and agencies heeded crisis warnings, and acted quickly to help hold off another famine.

    This year the situation is urgent as 5.4 million Somalis will need
    humanitarian aid.

    According to the charity, no fewer than 300,000 children under age five are acutely malnourished, including 48,000 severely malnourished children who face an increased risk of death.

    Some 1.1 million people fled their homes due to drought and conflict in 2017 in Somalia, adding to the one million people who were already displaced within the country from previous years.

    NAN

  • Boko Haram: Many IDPs not ready to return home – Norwegian agency

    Boko Haram: Many IDPs not ready to return home – Norwegian agency

    The vast majority of almost two million Nigerians driven from their homes by Boko Haram insurgency cannot return due to lack of security, an aid agency said on Wednesday.

    About 1.8 million people have been displaced in Nigeria by Boko Haram insurgency, which has left at least 20,000 dead and shows little sign of ending as it drags into its ninth year.

    The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) said in a report that 86 percent of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) were not ready to return home in the immediate future.

    Insecurity is cited by 84 percent of them as the main reason for wanting to stay put, it said.

    “Only about six in 10 people said they wanted to return to their villages at some point, but could not do so now,” the NRC  said.

    Many of the displaced people said they have tried to return home, only to be forced to flee back to safer camps and cities because of continued attacks by Boko Haram and general insecurity.

    “While the end game is for communities to return home, the unfortunate truth is that pushing people back now will have harmful consequences,” Reuters quoted NRC secretary general, Jan Egeland, as saying in a statement.

     

     

  • Famine puts 7 million Yemenis at risk, aid group warns

    The lives of some seven million people are at risk in war-ravaged Yemen due to famine, an aid group warned on Wednesday.

    Jan Egeland, the Head of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) in Cairo stated this after a tour of the impoverished Arab country.

    He said “the world is letting some seven million men, women and children to be slowly engulfed by unprecedented famine.”

    He added that 60 per cent of Yemen’s 27 million people were food insecure “and this makes Yemen the world’s largest food security crisis zone.”

    Yemen is locked in conflict with regional and religious dimensions, pitting the Saudi-backed government against Iran-allied rebels who seized the capital Sana’a and surrounding areas in late 2014.

    The war intensified since March 2015 when Saudi Arabia and fellow Sunni Muslim countries begun air campaign against the mostly Shiite rebels.

    Saudi Arabia fears that the rebels will give its regional rival Shiite Iran a foothold on the Arabian Peninsula.

    However, Yemen suffered from poverty, the lack of development and environmental problems even before the conflict escalated.