Somalia’s homeless top 1.5 million

The number of people made homeless by war or drought in Somalia has reached more than one and a half million. Most of those people are women and children who are now living in desperate conditions, according to the United Nations.

Hundreds of families are still fleeing the capital, Mogadishu, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has said. About 95,000 people have left parts of the East African country in the last two months and 77,000 of those were from Mogadishu.

Altogether some 3.8 million Somalis, almost half the population, urgently need humanitarian aid, according to the UN.

"One of the main reasons is that the humanitarian agencies are finding it very difficult to reach out to these people, to access them, because of the insecurity," said Roberta Russo, a spokeswoman for UNHCR.

In Afgoye, there's a lack of clean water, medical facilities, sanitation and latrines. And although many people know how poor conditions are in Afgoye, people fleeing Mogadishu are still on their way there. Fighting is the main reason many are leaving but drought and the lack of livelihoods are other factors.

"Basically, they need everything," said Ms Russo." Many people don't have the money and the opportunity to flee to further places. We're seeing that some people are even displaced from their homes in Mogadishu, but they're settling in other areas of the capital city, which are relatively safer. These are the most desperate people, who can't get money to pay their transport," she says.

Jowahir Ilmi, head of Somali Women Concern, a local aid organisation, said: "Every day we are registering new arrivals. Unfortunately, even the month of Ramadan has not led to a truce."

Fighting has been going on in Somalia since 1991, but it has flared in Mogadishu since Ethiopian troops withdrew from the country in December 2008, leading to thousands of deaths and injuries as well as the displacement of hundreds of thousands from Mogadishu and parts of southern and central Somalia.

And the situation is getting worse. Ali Sheikh Yassin, the deputy chairman of the Mogadishu-based Elman Human Rights Organization, said people were continuing to flee Mogadishu, “because the insecurity is increasing, not decreasing. As we speak, people are leaving and I am sure many more will join them. There is nothing to stay for. No peace and no hope for peace.”