WASHINGTON, Aug 1 (AFP) - The United States is sending 4.7 million dollars worth of additional food aid to nations in the drought-stricken Horn of Africa, a top USAID official announced Tuesday.

"Over 20 million people are at risk if this crisis is allowed to spiral into a true famine," said Leonard Rogers, a top official at the Agency for International Development, the US agency that provides humanitarian assistance around the world.

"The US government is treating this crisis as the highest priority humanitarian emergency in the world,"

SUDAN: Khartoum clears OLS flight plans
The Sudanese government on Monday cleared the Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) flight plan for August, including external flights from Lokichoggio, northern Kenya. UN Assistant Emergency Relief Coordinator Ross Mountain told IRIN on Tuesday that he welcomed the move. The OLS is a consortium of many of the humanitarian organisations operating in Sudan, including UN agencies. Mountain met senior government officials on Monday to discuss the breakdown of the humanitarian ceasefire in Bahr el Ghazal province, southern Sudan, and recent criticism of the

More than 20 million people at risk of starvation

By Charles W. Corey
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) on August 1 announced an additional $4.7 million in aid projects to reduce the suffering of some 20.6 million people in the Horn of Africa at risk of famine and disease from a continuing severe drought in the region.

Leonard Rogers, deputy assistant administrator for USAID's bureau of humanitarian response, announced the news at a press conference while stressing that the U.S. government is treating the humanitarian

Politics and planning
Bitter blow to self-sufficiency

Eritrea is going to need humanitarian aid for at least 18 months, much to the chagrin of its government which wants very much to stand on its own feet and make its own decisions.

"They really don't want to need help," says one international donor representative based in Asmara, "They are so determined to be self sufficient and before this war, they thought they would be able to show international organizations the door around now. But now they are going to be dependent on external help

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

DRC: More attacks in North Kivu

Incidents of banditry are on the rise in the Goma area of North Kivu, humanitarian sources reported on Thursday. The compound of MSF-Belgium was attacked last week by armed robbers, with communications equipment and flight tickets stolen. On 18 July, a truck preceding an MSF-Holland vehicle was attacked by "uncontrolled armed

KHARTOUM, July 28 (AFP) - Some 1,215 Eritrean refugees were brought back from east Sudan to camps around the town of Tesseney in west Eritrea Thursday, bringing the number of voluntarily repatriated refugees to 2,886 since the beginning of the operation last Tuesday, said the UN refugees agency.

UNHCR spokesman in Tesseney Peter Kessler Friday told AFP by telephone that Thursday's returnees were moved across the border from Laffa and Shegerab camps in Kassala state in 37 trucks.

The spokesman earlier said 18,000 Eritreans

DSG/SM/102, SC/6898
Following is the text of Deputy Secretary-General Louise Fréchette's opening remarks, delivered yesterday, to the Security Council debate on children and armed conflict:

Let me first thank you, Madam President, for convening this open debate of the Security Council on children and armed conflict.

The problem which brings us here today is one of the most disturbing human security issues facing the international community. It is also a great challenge to the United Nations, one which is close to the heart of the Secretary-General. He therefore deeply regrets

NAIROBI, July 27 (AFP) - The rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) on Thursday denied Khartoum's allegations that international non-governmental organisations working in the south were supplying it with arms and food.

In a statement released here Thursday, rebel spokesman Samson Kwaje said the allegations made by Sudanese President Omar el-Beshir last week "are lies not befitting a head of state and should, therefore, be dismissed with the contempt they deserve."

In a fiery speech in Khartoum on Saturday,

SOMALIA: Aid workers seized in Mogadishu
Unidentified gunmen operating in the south of the Somali capital, Mogadishu, have kidnapped a French woman and a British subject employed by the NGO, Action contre la Faim (ACF), a spokeswoman for the agency told IRIN on Wednesday. The spokeswoman, Beatrice D'Ervau, said they were taken on the night of 25-26 July: "Action contre la Faim is doing everything possible to secure their release. It is asking those holding them to release the members of its team as soon as possible."

Since the collapse of the Somali government