Gunfire, Thefts, Rains Crippling Somali Airlifts

In a major blow to the Somalia relief effort, outbreaks of looting, gun battles and bad weather have forced the indefinite suspension of most of the international airlifts flying emergency food into the country’s interior, officials said Tuesday.

The sharp deterioration of security over the last few days is affecting hundreds of thousands of famine victims in regional centers. They were just beginning to receive airlifted food after months of starvation.

The centers include two of three locations in Somalia being served by the U.S. military airlift. The American planes are now flying into only one town, Hoddur, where violence has remained at a minimum.

But Hoddur’s gravel airstrip has been damaged by heavy seasonal rains. A crew of American military engineers was scheduled to examine it to determine if it could continue to accommodate the heavy C-130 Hercules planes used to deliver food.

Relief officials working in Somalia say the rise in violence is directly traceable to the influx of emergency relief over the last month, the first food many towns have seen since March. Because civil war has reduced the Somali economy to ruins, relief supplies represent the only merchandise of value entering the country; accordingly, it becomes the target of numerous well-armed clan militias and bandit gangs.

Relief experts say the problems underscore the urgency of moving food from central points into the countryside for distribution.

“You can’t just let food sit in these places and become thief-bait,” said Robert Koepp, local representative of Lutheran World Relief, which has flown food into the Somali interior and other afflicted locations in the Horn of Africa for years. “Now it’s all falling apart.”

The suspensions come at a critical point for a long-term solution to the Somali crisis. Now is the time of year when relief agencies want to start taking seeds and tools to displaced Somali farmers in the hope of encouraging them to return to their farms.

As it is now, the large number of rural farmers gathering at feeding centers in the towns means that Somalia will miss another year’s harvest, making its people wards of the international community for at least another year and probably much longer. The cutoff of flights means that farm supplies, along with food, will not reach the interior in time.

In the most recent violent incident, an armed gang Monday broke into two Red Cross warehouses in Belet Huen, near the Somali-Ethiopian border, and stole all 870 tons of food. That was the entire supply for 23 feeding centers run by the International Committee of the Red Cross in Belet Huen and its environs. The kitchens were serving 41,000 particularly vulnerable famine victims, including women, children and the elderly, the Red Cross said.

The loss is especially crucial because American relief flights into Belet Huen--the main source of food--were suspended Friday when a U.S. plane was struck by a bullet during an airfield melee. The bullet hole was discovered when the plane returned to its Mombasa, Kenya, base; it caused no serious damage. But U.S. officials said that flights to Belet Huen will not resume until at least late this week, after American aid officials meet with local leaders to determine if the conflict has ebbed.

The United States on Monday also suspended relief flights into Baidoa, a south-central town hosting the largest population of malnourished displaced Somalis and refugees.

The suspension was ordered after a gunfight broke out in the town while an American plane was unloading supplies at its outlying airstrip. The fight between two heavily armed gangs from opposing clans left more than 12 dead and 30 injured, sources said. Although it did not occur near the airstrip, it was serious enough for Red Cross personnel in the town to immediately advise the American crew to take off.

The plane was the eighth of 11 U.S. craft scheduled to land Monday at Baidoa; the three other flights were canceled, and flights Tuesday and for the rest of the week were put on hold. The suspension occurred just as the U.S. airlift into Baidoa was about to hit its stride, after four more C-130’s arrived Sunday at Mombasa to bring the operation to full strength, 12 planes.

The third U.S. destination in Somalia, Hoddur, could also become the site of intensified violence. One lethal gunfight broke out there Saturday while two relief planes, Canadian and German, were unloading. Ground controllers advised both crews to take off immediately.

The U.S. airlift, with 14 planes in operation, is the largest of three or four international airlifts now serving the Somali interior.