Hungry and homeless lined up by the thousands for food Friday in Eastern Congo. United Nation is beginning it’s first large-scale delivery in this area since fighting broke out in late October.
U.N. World Food spokesman Marcus Prior said,50,000 civilians in the area are getting more than 100 tons of food in the area north of the provincial capital of Goma over the next four days.
Many of the refugees say there is plenty of food, there is just no place to go. Government militiamen have occupied fields near Kiwanja such as Musi Batai’s. “ They told me I had to pay them to take my food,“ he said.
Meanwhile, the U.N. refugee agency plans to move tens of thousands of refugees from two camps in Kibati to a new site 9 miles west next week because the area is just miles from the tense front line.
Aid groups have expressed concern about rape and other violence in the government-controlled camps. Eastern Congo has been unstable since millions of refugees spilled across the border from Rwanda's 1994 genocide, which saw more than 500,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus slaughtered.
On Thursday, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he will support a U.N. plan to send 3,000 more troops to Congo, but he said the force must have better leadership and equipment.
1 comment:
You have to wonder why it's taken the UN so long to make a large scale delivery. I understand that large organisations take a while to trundle into action but there are people desperate for help there.
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