The United Nations World Food Programme today announced that displaced Sudanese arriving in Wau, who are too malnourished and weak to prepare food for themselves, will be given cooked meals every day through a special feeding programme launched this week.
"Some of these people are so thin and malnourished when they arrive, they don't even have the energy to stand in line for food, never mind attempt to cook a meal," said Tesema Negash, WFP's Deputy Director for Africa who is currently running the agency's

The president of Sierra Leone, which has been terrorized by bands of rebel soldiers brutalizing its citizens, said on Thursday that the country's military had been discredited and should be disbanded.

But President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah emphasized at a meeting in Manhattan that future economic //development depended on the West African nation's security, and he outlined several options being considered to replace the embattled country's armed forces.

"We as a government have decided that our military is completely discredited and should be disbanded,"

UNITED NATIONS
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network
for Central and Eastern Africa
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Fax: +254 2 622129
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SUDAN: Task force to tackle food diversions

A top UN relief official confirmed to IRIN today (Friday) that the diversion of food aid from hungry people in southern Sudan, allegedly by armed rebel groups, was to be tackled by a joint task force which travels to southern Sudan early next week. The issue was raised in a session of the UN Security Council yesterday.

Flooding in eastern China was expected to intensify over the next few days as torrential rains hammer the region, weakening water-logged dikes, state media said on Friday.

A swell of water on the Yangtze River caused by downpours in the upper reaches was rushing through eastern provinces and bearing down on China's biggest city of Shanghai, officials said.

"Flooding will worsen along the Yangtze's mainstream, down from Wuhan, caused by the flood crest," the China Daily newspaper said.

Wuhan, capital of central Hubei province

Sudan Famine Update
Reports state 35 people are dying each day in Wau

WHAT: CARE is opening nine feeding centers for thousands of desperately ill and hungry Sudanese people who are staggering into Wau each day. Four of the centers, with a capacity to treat 3,600 people a day, will handle supplemental and therapeutic feeding for at-risk cases and children under five. Five others centers will feed up to 3,000 malnourished adults a day. A total of 65,000 people are estimated to be at risk in Wau.

Fighting between Government of Sudan

UNITED NATIONS
Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Integrated Regional Information Network
for Central and Eastern Africa
Tel: +254 2 622147
Fax: +254 2 622129
e-mail: irin@ocha.unon.org

[The weekly roundup is based on IRIN daily updates and other relevant information from UN agencies, NGOs, governments, donors and the media. IRIN issues these reports for the benefit of the humanitarian community, but accepts no responsibility as to the accuracy of the original sources.]

SUDAN: US minister urges pressure on Khartoum government

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Bureau pour la Coordination des Affaires Humanitaires / IRIN
pour l'Afrique Centrale et de l'Est
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REPUBLIQUE DEMOCRATIQUE DU CONGO (RDC)

Kabila demande aux troupes rwandaises de partir

Le President Laurent-Desire Kabila a ordonne a tous les soldats rwandais de quitter les forces armees de son pays. Un bref communique, lu lundi par un commandant de l'armee a la television nationale, declarait qu'il avait ete ordonne aux troupes rwandaises, qui

The following statement was issued today by the Spokesman for Secretary- General Kofi Annan:
The Secretary-General continues to be concerned about the situation in Guinea-Bissau and has been following recent developments closely. The Secretary-General welcomes the recent announcement of a truce in Guinea- Bissau, and the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the Government and the self-proclaimed Junta forces under the auspices of the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries. The Secretary-General renews his call for the early restoration of constitutional order. He also

Almost 1,000 children are currently under the care of the feeding centre being run by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Sudanese Red Crescent in the town of Wau, in one of the areas suffering most from the famine racking southern Sudan. The 27 Red Crescent volunteers working at the centre prepare thousands of meals a day on the cooking fires: as many as four a day for the most seriously affected children and one for each of the individual family members who accompany some of them.
About half of the children registered