D.R.CONGO: The UN World Food Programme began distributing food to people in the volcano-stricken Goma area of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) yesterday, a spokeswoman said.
The UN spokeswoman, Ms Brenda Barton, said in Nairobi the agency had begun distributing two-week rations of maize meal, vegetable oil, beans and maize-soya blend to some 30,000-50,000 people in Sake town, 27 km from Goma. "People were very happy to get the food," Ms Barton said. "They didn't have all the cooking utensils that we would have liked but they will group together to eat." Ms Barton said the UN expected to distribute food aid in Goma city today.
Until yesterday, uncertainty hung over the safety of the eastern DRC town and the UN focused its relief efforts on sites in neighbouring Rwanda, where camps had only attracted a fraction of those affected by Thursday's eruption of Mount Nyiragongo.
Those who fled the eruption number around 340,000, according to Ms Laura Melo of the WFP. "This afternoon, we'll be starting in Sake, a place about 20 km west of Goma where there are about 60,000 people," she said.Food distribution in Goma itself, to where many tens of thousands of people have returned, will begin "if not today, early tomorrow". On Tuesday, family heads were being registered in the city, much of which has been razed by a wide swathe of black lava.
Tankers in several areas of Goma were distributing water to long queues of people. The UN has about 1,000 tonnes of food - maize, beans and oil - stockpiled in Goma. This is enough to feed 200,000 people for about two weeks.
According to the Congolese Rally for Democracy (RCD), the Kigali-backed rebel group that has its headquarters in Goma, between 200,000 and 500,000 people have been made homeless by Nyiragongo's eruption. "Two sites have been chosen on the north-west of the city to take them in and allow them to rebuild their houses," said Mr Emile Ngoye, who heads an RCD emergency committee.
Some 12,000 Goma residents made their way to Bukavu, another DRC town on Lake Kivu, according to Mr Paul Stromberg, spokesman for the UN's refugee agency, UNHCR.
Like much of Goma, the UNHCR's offices were looted in the aftermath of the volcano eruption, which prompted most of Goma's residents to decamp to the Rwandan town of Gisenyi.
The RCD has warned looters they would be shot and 13 people have already been shot dead, according to reliable sources.
Meanwhile, the foreign ministers of Britain and France made flying visits to Rwanda and Burundi yesterday to push for peace in the Great Lakes region.
"These meetings represent an important commitment by France and the United Kingdom to intensify our work to secure a peaceful solution to the conflict in this region," the British Foreign Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, said in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, before flying on to Bujumbura.
Mr Straw and the French Foreign Minister, Mr Hubert Vedrine, began their tour in the DRC on Monday. Their talks have been overshadowed by the volcanic eruption in Goma.
Paul Cullen adds: Oxfam said that the international community had largely failed to help the DRC escape four years of war and so had a moral obligation to intervene following the eruption in Goma.
Dr Brian Scott, director of Oxfam Ireland, said: "The DRC urgently needs action. Exploitative companies and individuals involved in unethical trade must be stopped and there must be arms embargoes, disarmament, peace initiatives and much more aid."
He pointed out that the $194 million UN appeal for this year had so far received nothing. The year before, the appeal was under-funded by $50 million.
Oxfam Ireland and World Vision have joined Trócaire, Goal, Concern, UNICEF and the Irish Red Cross in running appeals for victims of the catastrophe.