Boggart Abroad: 10/03/15

Saturday, October 03, 2015

7.5 million Going Hungry As Ethiopia Famine Crisis Worsens

(Translated from Agence Free Presse)Addis Ababa - The number of Ethiopians affected by famine and needing food aid has risen sharply with around 7.5 million people now in need, aid officials said Friday. The situation is worsening daily and is caused by failure of the annual rains added to the effects of the El Nino weather phenomenon .

You know what this means readers? Another shite record from Band Aid coming up this Christmas

The number needing help has nearly doubled since August this year when the United Nations said 4.5 million were in need. UN representatives are now warning that without action some "15 million people will require food assistance" next year, more than inside war-torn Syria.

"Without a robust response supported by the international community, there is a high probability of a significant food insecurity and nutrition disaster," the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, OCHA, said in a report.

The UN children's agency, Unicef, has warned of over 300,000 children being in a severely malnourished state by the end of they year.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET), which makes detailed technical assessments of hunger, predicted a harvest "well below average" for the Horn Of Africa region in its latest report.

"Unusual livestock deaths continue to be reported," FEWS NET said. "With smaller herds, few sellable livestock, and almost no income other than charcoal and firewood sales, households are unable to afford adequate quantities of food."

Ethiopia, Africa's second most populous nation, borders the Horn of Africa nation of Somalia, where some 855,000 people face need "life-saving assistance", according to the UN, warning that 2.3 million more people there are "highly vulnerable".

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The First Casualty? Bizarre report from Afghanistan by BBC

Medicins Sans Frontiers clinic in Kunduz burns after being hit by US airstrike

In war truth is always the first casualty, goes an old newspaper maxim. It still seems to hold true in this age of on the spot reporters, rolling news and citizen journalism.

In the ten years this blog has existed (and admittedly there has always been much more activity on our UK hosted site until we learned that blog engine will close at the end of the year) we have seen BBC News become less an impartial reporter of events in Britain and the world and more like the Ministry Of Truth, the propaganda department of the Big Brother Regime in George Orwell's 1984.

About the only people who believe BBC reports are politicians, tax - eaters (public sector workers, schoolteachers, academics, NHS managers and professionals and the luvvies of the meeja and celebrity industry) But occasionally even the BBC cannot cover up the truth in service of its corporate masters agenda. This report from Afghanistan on how the city of Kunduz, recently overrun by the resurgent Taliban and according to official reports, almost immediately won back by Afghan Government troops is an example:

from BBC News:

Rights groups have expressed concern for the large numbers of civilians trapped in the Afghan city of Kunduz, amid fierce fighting between the Taliban and government troops.The government has accused the Taliban of raping and killing civilians after it seized the northern city this week. The Taliban rejected the accusations.

Both sides are claiming to be in control of much of the city.

But one resident of Kunduz told the BBC that he disputes the government's claims that the city has been retaken, saying he could see no evidence of government troops there.

So have The Taliban been kicked out of Kunduz, was there even a counter attack by government troops, did the Taliban even manage to gain control of the city? You guess is as good as ours. Everything you read or hear in news these days is carefully managed propaganda.