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Aid not getting to Somalia
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Published: November 7, 2009
NAIROBI, Kenya
U.N. officials said yesterday that the supply of critical food aid to Somalia had been interrupted and that rations to starving people needed to be reduced, partly because the American government has delayed food contributions out of fears that they would be diverted to terrorists.
Last month, American officials said they had suspended millions of dollars of food aid because of concerns that Somali contractors working for the United Nations were funneling food and money to the Shabab, an Islamist insurgent group with growing ties to al-Qaida.
Yesterday, the World Food Program said, "The food supply line to Somalia is effectively broken."
U.N. officials said that about 40 million pounds of American-donated food was being held up in warehouses in Mombasa, in neighboring Kenya, because American officials were not allowing aid workers to distribute it.
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