The Federal Foreign Office has made 1,000,000 euro available to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to enable it to provide emergency care for internally displaced persons in Somalia. The funds will be used to provide food, drinking water, medicine and emergency shelter for particularly affected groups of the population.

In the face of lasting armed conflicts the humanitarian situation, especially in the greater Mogadishu area, has continued to worsen. According to the United Nations, 260 civilians were killed in January alone and over 100,000 people were forced to leave their homes for security reasons. Most of them are seeking shelter in makeshift refugee camps; others are attempting to flee to neighbouring countries.

This country in the Horn of Africa has been in a state of humanitarian crisis for years. Due to the continuing internal conflict and an unusual period of drought that has made the situation worse, 3.8 million people – half of the population – require humanitarian aid.

The ICRC is among the few humanitarian organizations that are still able to provide assistance in Somalia. Working under difficult security conditions, it provides basic relief supplies to particularly affected groups, such as the injured or internally displaced.

Over the past three years, the German Government has made more than 30 million euro available for humanitarian assistance in Somalia.

For more information on the humanitarian assistance provided by the Federal Foreign Office please consult