250,000 flee homes in eastern Congo
by The Associated Press on Nov. 03, 2008, under Nation/World
Children run as a rumor spreads that a truck is to bring food aid at a camp for displaced peopleon Sunday in Kibati, just north of Goma in eastern Congo.
KIBATI, Congo – About 250,000 people have been forced from their homes in eastern Congo’s latest eruption of violence, and more than 60 percent of the refugees are believed to be children.
Thousands spent the night in the open, their mothers trying vainly to shield them from the chilly rain with cotton cloth or plastic sheets torn from sacks. Many are so weak and malnourished they have no protection against disease.
Aid groups say that children are being disproportionately hit by a crisis that could expand into a full-blown humanitarian disaster if assistance is not distributed soon.
“We’re all so hungry. And today it doesn’t look like we’ll get any food again,” said 13-year-old Louise Maombi, who was comforting her sick 3-year-old brother outside a free clinic north of the provincial capital of Goma.
Jaya Murthy, the spokesman in Goma for UNICEF, the U.N. humanitarian agency, said emergency food, medication and tablets to chlorinate water would soon be distributed at the Kibati camp. With many aid workers having fled eastern Congo, the agency said it would be Tuesday before food arrives.
