A United Nations envoy on Tuesday urged Eritrea to release nearly 100 000 tonnes of food aid feared to be rotting in warehouses as he appealed for donors to meet an urgent appeal to assist drought-hit East Africa.
After a five-nation tour of countries affected by the searing drought that has put about 15-million people at risk across the region, the envoy, Kjell Magne Bondevik, said he was concerned by Eritrea’s refusal to release the aid.
”The warehouses are closed and the government has the keys,” he told reporters at a news conference in the Kenyan capital at the end of his trip.
”There is no doubt we want this food distributed, and that is why I raised it with the president,” Bondevik said, referring to his talks last week with Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki in Asmara.
Although he discussed the matter with Isaias, Bondevik, the UN’s special humanitarian envoy for the Horn of Africa, failed to win the release of the food, much of which has been sitting in storage since last September.
He said Isaias told him the assistance had been ”integrated” into Eritrea’s long-term food security scheme that revolves around self-reliance and schemes aimed at allowing Eritreans to earn cash to buy their staples.
In September, the often-secretive state cut off free distribution of such assistance to 95% of recipients, slashing the number of beneficiaries from 1,3-million to about 70 000.
About 90 000 tonnes of food aid is now sitting in warehouses, and diplomats and aid workers have expressed growing concern that it may be progressively rotting even as the drought bites and puts more Eritreans in need.
While he did not win the release of the assistance, Bondevik said Isaias has pledged to renew a dialogue with humanitarian agencies that have complained of difficulties in their work.
”He gave an opening for that, but on specific criteria: the dialogue should be about the future, not the past history,” he said, without elaborating.
Eritrea was the first stop on Bondevik’s tour of the region for which the UN last month launched an urgent $426-million appeal for aid to stave off a catastrophe.
Only 20% of that goal has been reached so far, prompting fears that medium- and long-term development projects intended to help chronically drought-afflicted areas will be shunted off for emergency aid.
In addition to calling on donors to meet the appeal for Kenya, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia — and to a lesser degree Burundi and Tanzania — Bondevik urged the affected governments to do more to prevent future crises. — Sapa-AFP