GENEVA — The United Nations hopes to resume food distribution to tens of thousands of Somalis in the country’s war-shattered capital now that the government has released a top aid official, the U.N. humanitarian chief said Wednesday.
Idris Osman, head of World Food Program operations in Somalia, was freed in Mogadishu on Tuesday after being jailed for nearly a week. He was seized Oct. 17 when dozens of armed security agents stormed a U.N. compound.
After Osman’s arrest, the U.N. agency shut down food deliveries to about 76,000 recipients in the Somali capital, citing security problems. About 1.5 million Somalis need food aid and protection – 50 percent more than at the start of the year – because of inadequate rains, internal displacement due to violence and a potential cholera epidemic, according to the U.N.
Somalia has not had a functioning government since 1991, when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned on one another.
On Wednesday, a roadside bomb killed five civilians and wounded 16 when it hit a minibus full of passengers in Mogadishu, witnesses and hospital staff said.
John Holmes, the undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs, told The Associated Press in an interview in Geneva that the U.N. would continue its humanitarian work in Somalia despite the violence.
“It is difficult and dangerous, but it was difficult and dangerous before,” he said. “We have a responsibility to try and help the people who really need help. And they really do need help, both in Mogadishu and outside.”
