Food has run out for 100,000 refugees in Ethiopia, says UN
Abiy rules out dialogue with TPLF leaders; Ethiopian army seizes control of several towns; reports of conflicts around refugee camps very concerning: UNHCR
The United Nations says food has now run out for the nearly 100,000 refugees from Eritrea who have been sheltering in camps in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region, which has been cut off from the world for nearly a month amid fighting.
“Concerns are growing by the hour,” UN refugee spokesman Babar Baloch told reporters in Geneva on Tuesday.
“The camps will have now run out of food supplies — making hunger and malnutrition a real danger, a warning we have been issuing since the conflict began nearly a month ago. We are also alarmed at unconfirmed reports of atacks, abductions and forced recruitment at the refugee camps.” “For almost two decades, Ethiopia has been a hospitable country for Eritrean refugees but now we fear they are caught in the conflict,” Baloch said.
“UNHCR appeals to the government of Ethiopia to continue to fulfil its responsibility in hosting and protecting Eritrean refugees and allow humanitarians to access people who are now desperately in need.” In Mekele, aid workers report that people have been forced to rely on untreated water to survive following the damage and destruction of water infrastructure,” UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters on Monday.
“Our humanitarian colleagues are also warning that it is critical that essential supplies and services be restored immediately in Mekelle and across the Tigray region.” UN Secretary-general Antonio Guterres underscored that need in a phone call with Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on Sunday, Dujarric said.
Abiy again ruled out dialogue with the leaders of the defiant Tigray region on Friday but said he was willing to speak to representatives “operating legally” there during a meeting with three African Union (AU) special envoys trying to end the deadly conflict between federal troops and the region’s forces.
Meanwhile, the number of people managing to cross the border into Sudan has slowed to a trickle, raising concerns they are being blocked from leaving.
The Nobel Peace Prize-winning prime minister, who has resisted international mediation as “interference,” said he appreciated the AU envoys’
“elderly concern” but told them his government’s failure to enforce the rule of law in Tigray would “nurture a culture of impunity with devastating cost to the survival of the country,” according to his office.
Worryingly, refugees in Sudan have said that Ethiopian forces near the border are impeding people from leaving.
“We cannot keep social distancing here in the camp,” said Mohammed Rafik Nasri, from the UN refugee agency.
“It is really challenging among the several issues in need that are growing because the number is growing. Today we are receiving a convoy of 1,000 arriving in the camp. And shelter is one of the biggest challenges that we have at the moment.” “Reports of conflicts around refugee camps are very concerning,” said Juliete Stevenson, a spokeswoman with the UN refugee agency.
One humanitarian agency says hospitals in Tigray are running out of drugs.
The International Commitee for the Red Cross (ICRC), in a rare dispatch from inside Tigray, warned that health care facilities are running out of drugs and other supplies and health workers need help caring for the wounded.
While travelling in western Tigray, the ICRC found a number of displaced people living in a makeshit camp without food, water or medical care. “They told us they feared for their lives, and that they wanted safe passage out of the area.” Its statement added: “So much is still unknown on the level of violence and subsequent suffering that people in the Tigray region have endured in just three weeks.” The Ethiopian military has seized control of the town of Wikro, 50km north of the Tigrayan capital, a senior official said on Friday.
Government troops had also taken control of several other towns, officials added. There was no word from the three AU envoys. AU spokeswoman Ebba Kalondo did not say whether they can meet TPLF leaders, something Abiy’s office has rejected.
“Not possible,” senior Ethiopian official Redwan Hussein said in a message to the AP. “Above all, TPLF leadership is still at large.”