Refugees Daily - Internal Global Press Review

Italy said Wednesday it was sending an aid plane to the Horn of Africa with 40 tonnes of food for refugees in the overcrowded Dadaab camps in Kenya who have fled extreme drought and famine in Somalia.

The plane will take off from the United Nation's Humanitarian Response Depot in Brindisi in southern Italy on Tuesday evening, and will arrive in Nairobi on Wednesday morning, the foreign ministry said.

It will take over 40 tonnes of food aid including rice, maize, flour, sugar, vegetables and long-life milk "to contribute to supporting over 440,000 people in the camps in Dadaab," it said.

The aid will be distributed by the Red Cross and local authorities, in coordination with the World Food Programme (WFP) and the UN's Refugee Agency (UNHCR), it added.

The mission – which will cost 200,000 euros ($283,643) – comes on top of other humanitarian initiatives in the area, worth 11 million euros, and the nine million euros Italy set aside in emergency funds for the Horn of Africa.

The ministry said it expected to send further aid in the coming days.

Famine was declared in two Somali regions last month. The UN warned on Monday that the famine, which has killed tens of thousands of people, could soon spread to six more regions inside Somalia.

The drought has forced thousands of people to flee to neighbouring Ethiopia and Kenya, often walking for days or weeks in search of food and water.