WFP distributes food to war-displaced Kabezi residents

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has begun its delivery of food aid to some 44,170 people who have been displaced by fighting between rebels and the Burundian army in Kabezi Commune in the southwestern province of Bujumbura Rural, a WFP official told IRIN on Thursday. "Distributions stated on Tuesday and are still ongoing. It is planned to deliver 353 mt of food commodities," Karine Strebelle, WFP Reports and Information Officer, said. "The ration length is of 20 days". Fighting erupted in Kabezi last week, rendering the commune inaccessible. Strebelle said that on 19 March, a WFP-UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) team reached Ruziba area, about five kilometres from the town of Kabezi, but could not proceed farther due the fighting between government forces and fighters loyal to the Forces nationales de liberation (FNL) faction led by Agathon Rwasa. "[The] latest displacement is [the] most recent in a series of incidents caused by the fighting," Strebelle said. "People often uproot entire families for one or two weeks in search of safety and have to leave everything behind, including food supplies. When they return, their homes have more often than not been looted and their fields destroyed." The WFP country director in Burundi, Zlatan Milisic, said the agency was concerned about the nutrition status of displaced Burundians, "as well as the limited ability of the already poor and struggling communities hosting them to cope". "These repeated displacement and the continuing insecurity put the lives and livelihood of everyone in the area at stake," he said.