Intervention needed to avoid "impending catastrophe"

Asha Haji Ilmi, a women’s activist, has called for intervention in Somalia to protect civilians and avert an impending humanitarian catastrophe.

Ilmi, head of Save Somali Women and Children, a Mogadishu-based NGO, said the humanitarian and human rights situation was getting out of hand, "with a culture of impunity and no accountability for crimes against humanity” being committed by all sides to the conflict.

She said the transitional government was making the humanitarian situation worse by waging an economic war in Mogadishu. "The destruction and looting of Bakara market and the printing of fake currency has led to hyperinflation", seriously affecting the population’s ability to cope.

Ilmi said the situation had never been this bad in 17 years of civil war.

Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) Somalia, said the combination of a severe drought, civil insecurity and hyperinflation was pushing the country to the brink. If the situation were happening anywhere else "it would have triggered outrage".

Lazzarini said Somalia was "on the eve of a massive, massive humanitarian catastrophe", with an estimated 2.5 million people needing assistance.

"If things do not improve within the coming weeks, and it is not likely, then we will be confronted with the images of 1991-1992", when drought and civil strife claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Somalis.

Dennis McNamara, of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, an independent organisation based in Geneva, concurred that the situation in Somalia was the worst it had been in 17 years: "The country is on the edge of the abyss."

He said there was a lack of political interest in the country, because "Somalia has been in the international community's 'too hard to solve' basket for over a decade; unless we act now it is headed towards the catastrophe basket as well."

He said the world needs to engage all parties to the Somali conflict irrespective of affiliation. "The dialogue process should be coherent and include everyone", in order to find an acceptable solution, including the insurgency.

The United States has designated the Somali insurgent group "Al Shabab" a terrorist organisation. "Labelling does not help," said McNamara.

Combined Ethiopian and Somali government forces have been engaged in fierce fighting in Mogadishu against insurgents sympathetic to the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) and clan militias since UIC forces were ousted in late 2006.

According to human rights groups, at least 6,000 people have died and hundreds of thousands have been displaced in the conflict since 2006.

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