Congo food aid cut

People displaced by recent fighting in eastern Congo queue to receive aid food in Mugunga IDP camp outside of Goma. REUTERS/James Akena

People displaced by recent fighting in eastern Congo queue to receive aid food in Mugunga IDP camp outside of Goma. REUTERS/James Akena

Published Dec 3, 2013

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Rome - The UN World Food Programme (WFP) said Tuesday it would cut aid to the Congo, leaving thousands without enough food, because of a budget shortfall.

The Rome-based agency, stressing its reliance on voluntary contributions from the international community, said it “urgently” needed 75 million dollars to keep its programme in the war-ravaged central African nation going.

“It's hard not to think that the tremendous needs in the Philippines and Syria are overshadowing cries for help from less visible, under-reported parts of the world,” said the WFP's representative in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Martin Ohlsen.

Funding shortfalls have already led to a halving of rations distributed in the eastern province of North Kivu over the past six months, WFP said.

The agency estimated that one out of ten children in the Congo suffers from acute malnutrition, and that 6.3 million people out of a population of about 70 million need food aid.

Sapa-dpa

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