U.S. Halts Some Relief Flights to Somalia

The United States temporarily suspended airlifts to a key area of drought-stricken Somalia on Friday after a supply plane was struck by a bullet apparently fired by warring bandits, who intensified their plundering of relief supply areas.

The incident occurred as a U.S. C-130 plane was delivering food to the southern town of Belet Huen near the Ethiopian border early Friday morning. The plane unloaded its cargo and returned without further incident to Mombasa, Kenya, the base of the U.S.-operated supply effort.

“I suspect they didn’t know they were hit,” said Pentagon spokesman Joe Gradisher. The bullet hole, found in a tail section, was spotted during a post-flight inspection. None of the six crew members, six ground crew members and three Red Cross workers on the plane was injured, Gradisher said.

The incident illustrates the difficult nature of a supply effort in which the United States wants to help feed the famine-stricken nation but is determined not to become embroiled in ground hostilities. The flight was the second of four scheduled for the day, and when the third flight attempted to land, Red Cross officials on the ground waved it off because of intensified fighting.

U.S. officials also canceled flights to the area scheduled for today. But deliveries to two other Somali airstrips, in Hoddur and Baidoa, will continue, officials said, as will the parallel U.S. effort to airlift 500 Pakistani soldiers operating under the U.N. flag to protect humanitarian supplies in the Mogadishu port.

Officials coordinating the relief effort said they intend to continue the airlift to Belet Huen after the U.S. military determines it is safe to do so. “We’re working closely with the U.S. military and the Red Cross to move food in. But right now, the security has deteriorated,” said Jerry Lipsen, spokesman for the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The Belet Huen area is home to about 200,000 people needing assistance and has received almost a third of the total U.S. aid to date.

The U.S. airlifts are part of an international effort to relieve the famine-stricken country, where more than 100,000 people already have died from starvation and warfare. Smaller-scale efforts by Belgian, Canadian, German and French planes, working with other private relief agencies, are also under way.

Food is also being shipped by the United Nations to the ports of Mogadishu and Kismayu, but several countries unilaterally announced plans to airlift supplies when looters prevented much of that food from reaching inland areas. Officials estimate as much as half the 150,000 tons delivered to the nation has been stolen.