United Nations
Nearly 23 million people, or 55 per cent of the Afghan popula-tion, are estimated to be in crisis or experiencing emergency levels of food insecurity between now and March of next year, a UN spokesperson has said.
Farhan Haq, deputy spokesper-son for the Secretary-General, also pointed to reports that iso-lated clashes and violence affect-ing civilians and resulting in casualties continued countrywide this week.
In Jalalabad, he said, in Nan-garhar Province, gunfire directed at de facto authorities resulted in the deaths of two children on the 1 November.
Two days later, on Wednesday, a roadside radio-controlled impro-vised explosive device detonation reportedly targeting the de facto authorities killed two civilians.
On Thursday, armed clashes were reported in Bamyan Prov-ince, resulting in the injury of five people, including one civil-ian.
In its latest situation report, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) shows concern about “conditional humanitarianism” or attempts to “leverage” humanitarian assis-tance for political purposes.
Donors are also asking that trans-actions and other activities re-quired for humanitarian opera-tions are excluded from the scope of sanctions, to allow these ac-tivities to continue without im-pediment.
The Afghanistan Flash Appeal, which targets 11 million people with aid through the end of the year, seeks $606 million and is currently 54 per cent funded.
Since 1 September 2021, the UN agencies and their partners have reached 48,383 children with community-based education ac-tivities, supported 82,761 people with emergency shelter and non-food items, and provided 4.1 mil-lion people with food assistance.
About 580,050 people got pri-mary healthcare and 85,623 chil-dren under five received treat-ment for Acute Malnutrition.
Even prior to the events of 15 August, the humanitarian situa-tion in the country was one of the worst in the world.
By the mid-year mark, nearly half of the population, some 18.4 million people, was already in need of humanitarian and protec-tion assistance.
Protection and safety risks to ci-vilians, particularly women, chil-dren and people with a disability, were also reaching record highs. For its part, the Food and Agri-culture Organization (FAO) be-gan the autumn season wheat seed and fertilizer distribution campaign in the east of the coun-try.
Technical training sessions on agricultural best practices are also planned.
The agency expects to reach nearly 140,000 people in the provinces of Nangarhar, Kunar, Laghman and Nuristan. —APP
