Already hard hit by a mediocre growing season in 2011-2012, characterized by rainfall badly distributed in time and place, the population in North Tillabery has to share its meagre resources with the many refugees arriving from Mali. According to the authorities in Niger, more than 30,000 Malians from the Menaka area and an estimated 8,000 Niger nationals living in Mali have found refuge in Niger since the beginning of the year, fleeing the fighting between government forces and armed groups.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has just completed the distribution of seed and agricultural tools to approximately 15,000 displaced people around Agok in the southern part of disputed Abyei area. These people are among the one hundred thousand people who fled fighting in May 2011. 8 months on and these families are struggling to survive.
On 28th February, the International Committee of the Red Cross launches an appeal for an additional 12.3 million CHF (10 million Euros) to avert a major humanitarian crisis in the Sahel region.
Following the second round of presidential elections in late 2010 where both candidates claimed victory, tension and violence grew into a full-fledged armed conflict in Cote d'Ivoire. In the chaos, hundreds of children lost contact with their families.
The International Committee of the Red Cross recently provided over 27,000 farmers and herdsmen with three-month food rations and special seed to generate rapid harvests. Communities living in the Tillaberi region, to the north of the capital Niamey, are among the most vulnerable in Niger. Farmers and herdsmen are facing recurrent food insecurity in a context of persistent drought. In recent years, livestock has been decimated and harvests have been insufficient to feed the population.
On 5 September, the ICRC together with the Libyan Red Crescent, distributed hygiene kits to 1000 Sub Saharan Africans who sought refuge in the military port of Sidi Bilal, west of Tripoli. They are staying in abandoned fishing boats. Food supplies will be delivered to them in the coming days by the Libyan Red Crescent.
Medical facilities before the conflict were functioning in Tripoli, but access to health care and life saving treatment became very difficult since the city was turned into a battlefield. Dozens of wounded people who urgently needed treatment did not receive it and died. Health-care workers often couldn''t access medical facilities due to the fighting. At the same time, hospitals and local clinics needed adequate medical supplies to be able to treat the many war wounded.
Entire villages have been destroyed and health-care centres looted in western Cote d'Ivoire. As an uneasy calm settles, thousands of refugees and internally displaced people want to return home yet there is little to return to.
2010 to 2011 have seen a major series of crises which have affected ever increasing numbers of people. Demand for humanitarian assistance has reached an unprecedented level at a time when long term conflicts continue unabated, according to the ICRC's Annual Report launched in Geneva today (26th May 2011).
As a result of the recent and ongoing fighting in Libya, unexploded weapons left from the conflict are a major hazard for the country's civilian population. Unexploded ordnance and armoured vehicles, including rockets, shells and mortars, are strewn across public places and residential areas in Misrata, Ajdabiya and Benghazi. The risk for civilians is high.