afrol News, 26 March - Somalia's security has deteriorated to the extent that aid workers found it impossible to provide assistance to the country's more than one million internally displaced population.

Aid agencies, including World Vision, Save the Children and Oxfam, had earlier warned of impending humanitarian catastrophe in Somalia.

"Since then, the crisis engulfing Somalia has deteriorated dramatically while access to people in need continues to decrease; 360 000 people have been newly displaced and an additional half a million people are reliant on humanitarian assistance," an alliance of 40 aid agencies said in a statement.

"There are now more than one million internally displaced people in Somalia. Intense conflict in Mogadishu continues to force an average of 20 000 people from their homes each month."

The agencies cry comes at a time the UN Security Council perused through the Secretary General's report on Somalia.

Several options, including the deployment of up to 28,500 UN troops and police and 8,000 stabilisation force to Sudan, had been suggested. The forces will replace the already stretched African force.

But aid agencies - national and international - said the plight of displaced Somalis had been deteriorated by "record high food prices, hyper-inflation and drought in large parts of the country is leaving communities struggling to survive."

Somalia had been without a proper functioning government since the overthrow of the country's former dictator, Mohamed Siad Barre.

The Ethiopian-backed troops forced the Islamic Courts Union from power in December 2006. Since then, the government has been clashing with Islamic insurgents in Mogadishu.

But attacks have snowballed to other areas, including Jowhar, where insurgents freed prisoners from jail on Wednesday.

Five soldiers and two civilians were killed in the latest attack.

Aid agencies called on the international community and all parties to the conflict to urgently focus their attention on the catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Somalia.

"They must ensure access for humanitarian supplies, live up to their responsibility to protect civilians and address the environment of impunity," warning that "in the absence of a political solution to the current crisis, the humanitarian crisis will become more and more complex and will continue to deepen."

By staff writer

© afrol News

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