UK minister faults donors for mean drought aid

British Secretary of State for International Development Andrew Mitchell. Photo/FILE

Britain’s Secretary of State for International Development Andrew Mitchell said that western nations had offered “derisory and dangerously inadequate” levels of financial support for drought victims across Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia.

Mr Mitchell said that the fact that a famine has been declared by the UN “shows just how grave the situation has become.”

"It is time for the world to help but sadly the response from many countries has been derisory and dangerously inadequate.

"Britain is playing its part, with help for more than two million people across the Horn of Africa. Now others must do the same."

Britain recently offered £42 million for drought victims across the region but the BBC reported that the two largest economies of the European Union, Germany and France had offered less than £5 million between them.

The United Nations said that the lives of more than 11 million people across four countries are threatened by the worst drought in the Horn of Africa for 60 years.

Aid experts said the greatest tragedy was that early-warning systems had predicted the emergency but appeals had been ignored.

The UN humanitarian coordinator for Somalia, Mark Bowden, said $300m was needed in the next two months for Somalia alone.

However aid agencies do recognise that the situation in Somalia has not been helped by the warring factions in the country.

It was pointed out that two famine regions are controlled by Islamist insurgents of the Al-Shabaab groups, who in 2009 began blocking aid convoys to areas they control because of an ideological opposition to Western influence.

“Even in the absence of politics, humanitarian work is fraught in south Somalia, where aid workers spend hours negotiating safe passage and paying taxes imposed by bandits acting for different clans,” the Independent newspaper said.