More than 6.5 million Somalis are facing severe hunger as climate shocks, conflict, and aid cuts compound a humanitarian disaster. The crisis has displaced over a million people, who now live in squalid camps on the outskirts of Mogadishu and other towns.
Zeynab Ibrahim, a 38-year-old single mother, lost four of her ten children to hunger and disease after drought destroyed her village near Burhakaba. She now lives in a makeshift shelter in Kahda district, Mogadishu, with her surviving six children. 'We tried every means to survive – selling dried grass and digging up water from the barren earth. Unfortunately, there was nothing left,' she said.
Adan Roble, 77, has been displaced multiple times by drought, floods, and fighting between government forces and al-Shabaab. Last month, floods swept through his village near Janale, while military drones flew overhead. 'Imagine losing everything and trying to survive without food and clean water, while fighting continues around you,' he said.
Nearly 1.9 million children under five are acutely malnourished, according to the latest IPC report. Almost 500 nutrition clinics have closed due to funding shortfalls, leaving children without care. In Kismayo general hospital, over 700 malnourished children were admitted in three months, with ten dying.
The situation has worsened after US aid cuts and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which has driven up fuel and food prices. UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher described the crisis as 'a moment of reckless geopolitics, of war, conflict, indifference and cruelty.'
