Agence France-Presse:
On Monday, the United Nations sounded the alarm about “spreading violence and increasing humanitarian needs” in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Armed groups have spread terror among civilians in the region for decades and forced large numbers to flee.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in a statement that senior aid officials “contributed to an immediate expansion of humanitarian operations” in eastern DRC “after months of continued violence and growing humanitarian needs.”
He added that the focus is on providing food and protection as well as on the spread of treatable diseases in the volatile areas of Ituri, North Kivu and South Kivu.
Last week, at least 46 people, half of them children, were killed in an armed attack on a camp for the displaced in the north-east of the country.
Since then, “thousands of thousands have fled the site” in the northeastern Ituri province, the office said.
“The brutality that armed groups are inflicting on local communities and the scale of the humanitarian needs are unparalleled,” Bruno Lemarqui, Humanitarian Coordinator for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, said in the statement.
“The suffering is enormous. Millions of people desperately need humanitarian assistance,” he added.
“We are fully committed to this expansion of our response,” he added.
OCHA cited a “deadly” combination of violence, natural disasters, poverty and lack of basic services leading to hunger and malnutrition.
“Many rural communities have no choice but to abandon their fields for fear of attacks,” he added.
He warned that outbreaks of diseases such as Ebola, measles and cholera also contributed to the humanitarian crisis.
Since March 2022, 2.8 million people have been forced from their homes in North Kivu, South Kivu and Ituri provinces, according to OCHA.
He added that the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a vast country rich in minerals, currently records 6.3 million displaced persons, the highest number of any African country.
The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs stated that despite the size of the needs, funding for the humanitarian response remained low, with funding at a level of only 28%.
Dozens of local and foreign armed groups are active in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, as a result of the regional wars that took place in the nineties and the year two thousand.