SW News: Catholic aid agency Caritas Internationalis has joined the appeal of Ethiopian prelates to the US Agency for International Development (USAID) for resuming the distribution of food in starvation-hit areas of the Horn of Africa country.
It was on March 30 this year that the aid agency put a halt on the distribution of food in the restive Tigray region after “widespread and systemic” of supplies meant for the starving people were reported. By early June, food aid for the whole of Ethiopia was put on hold.

In a statement, Caritas Secretary General Alistair Dutton said, “For three months, millions of people in need of vital assistance have been deprived of food, drastically reducing the health and security of those already suffering from severe trauma and deprivation following a two-year war and prolonged drought.
Dutton said that with the food distribution process put on hold, human lives are in jeopardy. The worst affected are the sick, the elderly, children and internally displaced people. “People are starving to death. In recent weeks, hunger has killed hundreds of people in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region as a result of food shortage. This is neither humane nor moral,” he said.

The secretary-general said that pilfering of food aid cannot be tolerated and the culprits should be brought to book. Dutton also called for a thorough probe into the whole affair and transparency has to be ensured to prevent any such incidents in the future. However, he said that innocent people are not the ones to suffer in the meantime. The primary concern has to be the suffering people of Ethiopia who entirely depend on humanitarian assistance, he said.
A similar plea was made by His Eminence Cardinal Berhaneyesus  Demerew Souraphiel, the head of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Ethiopia; Rev. Kes Yonas, the president of the Mekaneyesus Evangelical Church of Ethiopia; and Abune Mathias, the Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. They said that suspending vital support is causing widespread starvation.