As the noose tightens around holdout jihadists in west Mosul, so does the belt around the waists of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians trapped there with dwindling supplies. “We’re trying to build up some reserves but we have very little food left at home,” said Umm Sameer, a mother from the Ras al-Jadda neighbourhood … Read more
Living conditions in west Mosul, where jihadists are hunkering down among 750,000 Iraqi civilians, are deteriorating fast and a source of great concern, the UN’s top aid official said Wednesday. “We are extremely concerned about the rapid deterioration of the conditions in west Mosul,” United Nations humanitarian coordinator in Iraq Lise Grande told reporters. “Families … Read more
The top UN official in Damascus has warned of a “looming humanitarian catastrophe” in four besieged towns in Syria, calling for immediate access to deliver aid to some 60,000 residents. In a statement late Monday, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Syria, Ali al-Za’atari, warned of dire conditions in the towns of Zabadani, Madaya, Fua and … Read more
The United Nations appealed on Wednesday for $2.1 billion to provide food and other life-saving assistance to 12 million people in Yemen who face the threat of famine after two years of war. “The situation in Yemen is catastrophic and rapidly deteriorating,” Jamie McGoldrick, U. N. humanitarian coordinator in Yemen, said in the appeal document. … Read more
The conflict-driven food crisis in Yemen could become a full-blown famine this year, the UN’s humanitarian chief has warned. Two million people need emergency food aid to survive and child malnutrition has risen 63% in a year, Stephen O’Brien told the UN Security Council. A child under five dies every 10 minutes of preventable causes, … Read more
Children paying the price in battle for Aleppo A Syrian man carries a girl from a destroyed building after barrel bombs were dropped. A barrel bomb killed a family of six in rebel-held eastern Aleppo early on Sunday and rebel shelling took the lives of eight children at a school in the west, as one … Read more
Around 14 million people will need humanitarian help in the former northeast Nigerian stronghold region of Boko Haram militants and tens of thousands of children will be at risk of dying from famine, a U. N. official said on Tuesday. The Islamist militant group has killed 15,000 people and displaced more than 2 million from … Read more
Nearly five million people in Somalia are suffering from a shortage of food due to poor rainfall, floods and displacement, the United Nations says. More than 300,000 children under the age of five are severely malnourished and require urgent assistance. Most of those in need of help have been internally displaced following decades of conflict. … Read more