U N I T E D   N A T I O N S
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network for Central and Eastern Africa

Tel: +254 2 622147
Fax: +254 2 622129
e-mail: irin@ocha.unon.org


HORN OF AFRICA
IRIN-HOA Weekly Round-Up 355
9 - 15 December 2006


CONTENTS:

SOMALIA: Aid workers need increased access - UN official
SOMALIA: Bid to avert all-out war
SOMALIA: Diarrhoea kills 40 in Puntland
SUDAN: Darfur polio campaign affected by violence
SUDAN: Rising insecurity affecting relief operations

See Also:

SUDAN: The long journey home to the south at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=56730]


SOMALIA: Aid workers need increased access - UN official

Somalia is one of the worst places for humanitarian actors but they 
should strive to negotiate access to help Somalis living in extremely 
poor and underdeveloped conditions, a senior United Nations official 
said on Thursday.

"We are not where we should be; even if the environment is not 
conducive, this should not stop us from negotiating access," Eric 
Laroche, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, said at the launch 
of an appeal for US$237 million to alleviate the suffering of 1.8 
million Somalis.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=56740]


SOMALIA: Bid to avert all-out war

The international community is trying to avert an all-out war in Somalia 
amid reports that forces of the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) are 
massing in the south of the country, in anticipation of a showdown with 
forces of the Transitional Federal Government, a diplomat said on 
Wednesday.

"Our aim is to try to avert any escalation of the conflict into an 
all-out war," Mario Raffaelli, the Italian special envoy to Somalia, 
said. "We want them at the negotiating table, not on the battlefield."

[Full story at:
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=56721]


SOMALIA: Diarrhoea kills 40 in Puntland

An outbreak of watery diarrhoea in Somalia's northeastern self-declared 
autonomous region of Puntland has claimed the lives of about 40 people 
over the past five weeks, medical sources said on Monday.

"At least 39 people, 80 percent of them children under the age of five, 
have died in the last five weeks of watery diarrhoea," Abdirahman Sa'id 
Mahamud, the Puntland Minster of Health, said.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=56693]


SUDAN: Darfur polio campaign affected by violence

Fighting in the western Sudanese region of Darfur has affected a second 
round of polio vaccination in parts of North Darfur, aid workers said on 
Thursday.

"The second round, which was scheduled for 10-12 December, has been 
partially done in government-controlled areas," Ute Kirch, Darfur 
project coordinator for the German NGO, Malteser International, said. 
"In the other areas, NGOs did not implement it.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=56735]


SUDAN: Rising insecurity affecting relief operations

Escalating violence in Darfur, which has forced more than 80,000 people 
to flee their homes in the past six weeks and prompted several relief 
agencies to relocate staff, is jeopardising humanitarian operations in 
the western Sudanese region, aid workers said.

"The more violence there is in Darfur, the more difficult it is for the 
aid community - and even more so for the people who live there," Jessica 
Barry, spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross 
(ICRC) in Sudan, said on Monday.

[Full story at: 
http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=56688]


IRIN-CEA
Tel: +254 2 622147
Fax: +254 2 622129
Email: IRIN@ocha.unon.org

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Appropriate Donations for International Disaster/Humanitarian Needs
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Center for International              web: www.cidi.org
    Disaster Information          listserv: www.cidi.org/listsub.htm
                                guidelines: www.cidi.org/donate.htm
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -