GENEVA, 20 November 2008 (IRIN): The UN is asking for a record 7 billion US dollar to help 30 million people in Africa and the Middle East.
– The money is being used to keep people alive, said John Holmes, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, at the Consolidated Appeals Process launch in Geneva on 19 November.
The fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a country suffering from conflict for more than a decade, for which 831 million US dollar is being asked, and the ongoing plight of Sudan, where the UN and aid agencies need just over 2 billion US dollar, weighed heavy on the appeal, along with Somalia, needing 919 million US dollar.
– More than 100.000 children are on the run in the Kivus, along with their families, said Hilde Johnson, deputy head of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), referring to the troubled region of the DRC.
In total, some 1,3 million people are displaced in Congo, 250.000 of them since the outbreak of renewed violence in August.
– The humanitarian situation in the DRC is extreme, said Elisabeth Rasmusson from the Norwegian Refugee Council, adding that even in areas where aid groups could operate, the amount of assistance given was insufficient.
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