UN, aid partners appeal for nearly 2 bln USD to help millions of people affected by Sahel crisis

Aid organizations in the Sahel region on Wednesday called for nearly 2 billion U.S. dollars in 2016 to provide vital assistance to millions of people affected by crises in nine African countries across the Sahel, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said.

The Regional Humanitarian Coordinator, Toby Lanzer, said that in the Sahel, the combined effects of climate change, abject poverty, fast population growth and a tormenting rise in violence and insecurity dangerously undermine the lives, assets and future prospects of some of the most vulnerable communities in the world, Farhan Haq, the deputy UN spokesman, said at a daily news briefing here.

In 2016, some 23.5 million people -- almost one in six -- will not have enough to eat, Haq noted. "Of them, at least six million will require emergency food assistance, and acute malnutrition will threaten the lives and development of 5.9 million children under five."

The UN Security Council on Tuesday called on the international community to provide Libya and its neighbors in Africa's Sahel region with security assistance in the struggle against al-Qaida-linked terrorist groups.

In a presidential statement released here, the 15-nation UN body said Libya remains a safe haven for terrorist groups operating in the Sahel region and expressed its "deep concern" that unsecured arms and their proliferation through transfer to terrorist groups have posed a threat to stability in the region.

The Sahel is the ecoclimatic and biogeographic zone of transition in Africa which stretches across the south-central latitudes of Northern Africa between the Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea.

The region covers parts of northern Senegal, southern Mauritania, central Mali, northern Burkina Faso, extreme south of Algeria, Niger, extreme north of Nigeria, central Chad, central and southern Sudan, and northern Eritrea. Enditem