A non-governmental Canadian organization (NGO), Health Partners of Canada, will donate medical aid to one of Somalia’s central regions. On Monday Hiran Development Agency (HDA), a Somali NGO, said in a statement that the shipment of the donated aid is expected to arrive in Beletwein at the end of this month.
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Both Somaliland and Puntland have deployed hundreds of militia in the disputed Sool region, Radio Midnimo in Bosaso reported. The region, located within the borders between Somaliland and Puntland, has been claimed by both sides. Since Somaliland seceded in 1991, it has claimed that the Sool region falls geographically within the British protectorate and is thus a part of its territory. The autonomous region of Puntland, established in 1997, also claims that most of the clans in the disputed region are of Puntland origin. Sources said tension was high in the area as the two sides were trying to assert control over the region and win the support of its inhabitants.
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On Sunday press reports said that hundreds of Somali, Sudanese and Ethiopian refugees stormed the United Nation’s offices at their camp in northern Kenya. They were demanding a solution to the problem of insufficient firewood. According to Nando Times, the dispute began last week when Kenyans who collect firewood for the Kakuma Camp refused to deliver the wood unless they were paid 83 cents for every 22 pounds — more than six times the 13 cents the UN now pays them. The demonstration was broken up by police. Although no casualties were reported, three persons at the camp have already been killed in a related protest. The camp is home to 90,0000 refugees, most of them Somalis who have fled the inter-clan fighting in their home country.
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Somalia and other Horn of African countries have became a leading destination for illicit weapons. The weapons have in turn contributed to insecurity, economic decline and political instability, a German official told the UN information unit on Monday. Bettina Gruber, the head of administration at the German Technical Cooperation Agency (GTZ), who participated in a small arms conference in Nairobi, said: "It is the Horn of Africa that is flooded with small arms to the extent that no other region of Africa is. The arms not only dictate the forms and intensity of local armed conflicts, but also the everyday life of the people." Last week UN experts said that a failure to enforce a decade-long UN arms embargo on Somalia was undermining regional efforts to bring stability to the country. They suggested that the 1992 arms embargo against Somalia could be improved by direct intervention with states which neighbor Somalia.
