Tens of thousands of tons of food for starving refugees in Ethiopia are rotting on arrival piers, the U.N. High commissioner for refugees said early in November.

The agency’s Geneva headquarters said at least 71,000 tons of food “is scattered on piers” in the port capital of the neighboring nation of Djibouti.

There is also more than 600 tons of relief food supplies in the town of Dire Dawa, it said, “but security is dramatically deteriorating in the eastern part of Ethiopia, seriously threatening the distribution of food to the refugee camps. In Dire Dawa, all movement of vehicles has been suspended.”

Unknown gunmen have been shooting at food convoys and one convoy from Djibouti was hijacked twice on the open road.

The report said there are more than 500,000 refugees in the camps and food stocks “are very low.” Without an improvement in the situation, “the camps will run out of food very soon.”

Since the dismantling of the previous Ethiopian regime, the U.N. agency said, the new provisional government has been unable to provide adequate security. Various measures are being considered by the UNHCR, including getting food to the camps via the port of Berbera or even repatriating the refugees to their homes in northwestern Somalia.

Source: UPI, Geneva (Nov. 19)