Food convoys reach 12,000 in four days

Premiere Urgence, a French NGO in Guinea working on behalf of the UNHCR, began distributing food on Thursday to thousands of refugees and displaced Guineans living in camps and villages at Teldou, Kolian and Ouladen, some 30 km southwest of Guekedou. The food was provided by the World Food Programme (WFP).

UNHCR reported that 11 of its five-tonne trucks arrived at the sites on Wednesday and that, by the following day, some 12,200 beneficiaries would have received food since the start of a massive effort to feed refugees and internally displaced persons in the area, known as the Parrot's Beak. This was the third food convoy to reach the area since the effort began on Monday.

UNHCR reported that the beneficiaries - 3,600 Guineans and 8,600 Sierra Leoneans - were displaced from their homes and refugee camps when insurgents from Sierra Leone attacked Guinean border villages in September 2000. They had not received food deliveries since then.

Each beneficiary is given roughly 15 kg of food, which represents a daily ration of 2,100 kilocalories - the accepted standard, UNHCR reported.

UNHCR spokeswoman Delphine Marie told IRIN that the next food deliveries would include Koundou Lengo Bengo, which hosts some 9,000 refugees and IDPs, Owet-Djiba (4,000), Baldou (2,800) and Nongoa (10,000). UNHCR said that in the next 10 days it hoped to reach a camp of 30,000 people at Kolomba, at the tip of the Parrot's Beak - an area that juts into Sierra Leone.