From: jnr@igc.apc.org (Jim Rosenfield)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african
Subject: Re: 10/07 Wire stories on hunger
Date: 8 Oct 92 00:22:00 GMT
Nf-ID: #R:cdp:1471700165:cdp:1471700175:000:6266
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!jnr    Oct  7 17:22:00 1992


/* Written  5:19 pm  Oct  7, 1992 by jnr in cdp:hunger.general */
APn  10/05 1235  Somalia-Sahnoun Q&A

Copyright, 1992. The Associated Press. All rights reserved. 


MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) -- Mohamed Sahnoun, an Algerian diplomat
who represents U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali in
Somalia, spoke recently with the AP's Edith M. Lederer about the
situation in the famine-struck nation. 

Q: What are the biggest problems in Somalia today? 

A: It's still people dying from hunger and hunger-related
diseases. 

Large areas of Somalia have still never been touched by the
emergency relief program. This includes parts of the south, the
whole central region, the northeast, the northwest. 

The second problem is security. Because of the scarcity of food
and the long delay in mounting this assistance operation, we have
people who are ready to fight and to loot for food. 

It is certainly one of the worst situations we have ever seen
because there was a very long civil war and drought and we did
not intervene. So now we find the country in chaos, and that is
why the task is extremely complex and long. 

Q: What is being done to alleviate these problems? 

A: We have to try to see that there is some kind of equity in the
distribution of food. And, therefore, we have to enhance security
of this humanitarian operation. That is why we are trying to
bring U.N. troops into Somalia. The first 500 are already here.
We need more, especially to secure the ports outside Mogadishu. 

Q: Is the international community doing enough? 

A: The international community has again responded too very late.


The amount of food received is only now beginning to be at the
appreciable level. It's still not enough, and people are still
dying by the hundreds every day. 

We estimated the minimum needs for the whole of Somalia at around
50,000 tons per month. We have been receiving about 20,000. Over
the next 100 days, we hope to be receiving 100,00 metric tons,
still too little. 

We should provide more food to the 4.5 million people who are now
in great need, especially the one million who are threatened by
hunger and disease. 

The international airlift has been of tremendous help in reaching
remote areas where roads are not very secure. We hope that it
will be sustained. We need to carry on more airdrops in the
current rainy season when most airfields will not be operational.


In other sectors -- health, water and sanitation -- we are still
far, far behind. We need volunteers and financial support from
the international community to restore these services. 

Only 10 to 12 hospitals are functioning partially out of 70
hospitals in the whole of Somalia. The water system has been
destroyed virtually everywhere. The sanitation problem is getting
worse and worse. Dead bodies buried at the edge of rivers are
being carried into the water. This will create very serious
problems because most people in southern Somalia drink river
water. 

Q: What are the biggest frustrations? 

A: There are so many. 

I think we have gotten over the biggest frustration -- the near
silence and scant interest in the plight of the Somali people at
the beginning. For months and months, we were seeing people dying
by the thousands. Now there is more interest and we feel better. 

The second big frustration is the security issue. It's
frustrating to sometimes see food stored for days at the port of
Mogadishu because of the security problems when just a couple of
miles away people are dying from hunger.

We argue with some of these armed groups. We say, "It's your
brothers, your sisters, your sons, your daughters who are dying.
How can you stop this food from getting to them?" But it's
extremely difficult. They seem to be living in another world.
It's almost a kind of survival instinct. They don't care. They
want to first have their and their clan's share. 

Q: Do you see an end to the famine and to the state of anarchy? 

A: I think we might check the situation if we increase the
assistance, sustain the airlift, and get more people to come and
involve themselves in the relief operations. I don't think we'll
see the very end, but we might make it not as frustrating as it
is right now. 

Anarchy -- that's a different thing. The situation is so, so
chaotic. The Somalis have been left alone fighting each other for
such a long time that reconciliation is very difficult. Their
society has broken into 1,000 pieces, so you can imagine the
problems of putting it together again. 

The Somalis rely on their families and sub-clans for survival.
They're extremely jealous of whatever small power they have. So
our approach now is to try to reconcile the people on a local
basis and on a regional basis, and then hopefully on a national
level. 

We are making some progress. We are trying to use the clan
elders. Their traditional role has been challenged by the armed
groups and the warlords. But their conciliation and mediation
ability is still important. 

Q: Some politicians and commentators have said the only solution
is for the United Nations to take over Somalia and run it as
trusteeship. Is this a possibility or is it out of the question? 

A: If there was no other alternative to stop the dying, the
starvation and the anarchy but for the United Nations to take
over, yes, I might be all for it.

But I believe there are alternatives, and we should, of course,
put all our weight behind them. 

I believe that we are proving gradually that we can work within
the Somali context. We want to promote a civil society. This is
vital. We should have a trust fund for that purpose. We also want
to rebuild institutions like the police force and generate
employment. 

We can also gradually try to provide other alternatives to these
young people who have guns, who are creating security problems
for us. Why don't we try to open some schools? 

Q: You will be chairing a U.N. donors' conference in Geneva on
Oct. 12. What does it hope to achieve? 

A: We hope that most of the important donor countries will come
-- the Europeans, the United States, some rich OPEC countries. 

We will be proposing a 100-day program, including vaccination,
restoration of part of the health, sanitation and water systems,
and regeneration of agriculture.