UNITED NATIONS, March 22 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations on Wednesday reported that the humanitarian situation continues to deteriorate in Somalia at a time when the threat of famine is looming in the Horn of Africa country.
Nearly 257,000 people were internally displaced from November 2016 through February, and some 4,300 Somalis have crossed the border into Ethiopia, Farhan Haq, deputy UN spokesman, said at a daily news briefing.
More than 13,000 cases of acute watery diarrhea/cholera are suspected, with more than 300 deaths from those illnesses reported since the beginning of the year, he said.
The overall 2017 humanitarian appeal of 864 million U.S. dollars for Somalia is only 31 percent funded so far, Haq said. "That appeal is expected to be revised soon to take into account the increasing needs outlined in the famine prevention operational plan."
The UN agricultural agency will be further scaling up its activities in drought-hit regions of Somalia, thanks to a 22-million-U.S.-dollar loan approved this week by the UN emergency response fund.
"More than 2.9 million people are at risk of famine and many will predictably die from hunger if we do not act now," Stephen O'Brien, UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and UN emergency relief coordinator, said Tuesday.
Across Somalia, 6.2 million people will face acute food insecurity through June 2017. Of these, nearly 3 million people are in Phases 3 (crisis) and 4 (emergency) of the five-phase International Phase Classification for Food Security, representing more than a two-fold increase from six months ago. Phase 5 is famine.
The grave humanitarian situation in Somalia has been further aggravated by drought, which pushed some to flee the country in February.
Since the start of the year, more than 3,770 Somali new arrivals have been recorded at Melkadida in Ethiopia, and acute malnutrition has been reported in around 75 percent of the arriving child refugees.
