26/11/12 United Nations World Food Programme – Congo-Kinshasa: Hunger Crisis Looms As Families Flee Fighting in Eastern Congo

WFP distributed emergency
food rations over the weekend to roughly 81,000 displaced people who have taken
refuge in and around Goma, the capital of the conflict-affected North Kivu province of Democratic
Republic of Congo
(DRC).

 

Most of the families
assisted fled in recent days to the provincial capital from camps for the
displaced, including Kanyaruchinya, 10 kilometers north
of Goma, and Sake, west of the city. They received emergency food rations
consisting of maize meal, pulses, salt and cooking oil, contributed by Canada, Japan
and the United States of
America.

 

WFP is concerned about
the fate of tens of thousands of people in Eastern Congo
who have fled a new wave of fighting and who have little access to food and
other basic necessities. It estimates that some 140,000 civilians in Goma alone
may require WFP food assistance.

 

"The spiral of
violence in North Kivu has cut many people off
from their regular food supplies and they need emergency assistance to
survive," said Martin Ohlsen WFP Country Director in DRC.

 

Access to needy

 

Until last week, WFP was
distributing food to around 470,000 displaced people in North
Kivu. But when unrest spread to Goma last week, it was forced to
suspend operations temporarily.

 

The agency restarted food
distributions in Goma within days and expects to resume planned food
distributions in accessible areas of North Kivu as soon as possible, although
the precarious security situation may make it difficult for WFP to reach those
needing assistance beyond the provincial capital.

 

"We call on those
involved in the ongoing conflict to respect the neutrality of aid workers and
ensure that humanitarian agencies have access to those in need," Ohlsen
said.

 

WFP urgently needs more
funding to respond to this latest crisis, and is calling on the international
community to further support its work in the Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC).

 

Even before the
developments of this week, WFP faced a funding shortfall of $23 million for the
next six months of its emergency operations in eastern DRC, where more than one
million people have been receiving WFP food assistance in five eastern
provinces. The new unrest will increase humanitarian needs.

 

Altogether, some 2.4
million people are displaced in eastern DRC, according to the October reports
of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).