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LV Refugee camp in Hargeisa area of Somalia
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GV Women carrying buckets to water hole in camp (3 shots)
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GV Young boy carrying bucket of water on head
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LV Of tent village on hill of camp PULL BACK TO Sacks of grain being unloaded off lorry (2 shots)
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GV Of men carrying sticks into encampment
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GV Of woman squatting on ground
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CU Child drinking from tin mug.
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GV Women carry out "housework" around their tent area (2 shots)
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Initials AM/





Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: The fate of thousands of starving refugees in Somalia is now even more critical because of oil shortage caused by the war between major producers, Iran and Iraq. It's estimated that eight hundred thousand will be completely out of food in a week unless there is an international effort to divert oil tankers on the high seas to Somalia.

SYNOPSIS: It's refugee camps like this one at Hargeisa on the northern section of the Ethiopian border that will be effected. Aid officials say it is becoming impossible to transport enough food to thirty two refugees camps because the fuel allocations are far short of requirements.

The latest food crisis has hit several camps already. When this film was shot supplies were already dwindling. In the south on the Kenyan border, where camps are holding as many as sixty thousand refugees, stocks are exhausted.

Few refugees have camels with them to supply milk. These people rely on the camp water hole for liquid nourishment. The refugees need four hundred and eighty tons of food a day, but for the past week (to Friday 3 October) food deliveries have been interrupted. The allocation of diesel fuel to lorries like this one is only two thirds of that needed to reach all the camps. Any interruption to food deliveries puts twenty percent of the children in the camps at immediate risk of death.

Hundreds of refugees are still crossing into Somalia every day as the war continues in the Ogaden. They bring reports of fresh fighting between the Western Somali Liberation Front Guerrillas and the Ethiopians. There has been no break in the drought and the Iran/Iraq war could be the final blow to the already catastrophic situation of the nomad refugees.