International aid agency Oxfam will fly out with 14 tonnes of water, sanitation and hygiene equipment on Thursday 15 February to help thousands of people who have been left homeless by severe flooding in Mozambique. Heavy rains and rising flood waters are forecast to continue in the region this week, which threatens to worsen the situation of up to 285,000 people living in vulnerable areas.
International agency Oxfam is providing assistance to people affected by flooding that has hit the greater Jakarta area since 1 February 2007. Oxfam Australia has deployed Jane Bean and Ben Fraser to Jakarta to join the relief effort.
Leading Australian aid agencies today warned the enormous humanitarian response in Darfur will soon be paralysed unless African and global leaders at the African Union (AU) Summit take urgent action to end rising violence against civilians and aid workers. They said African Heads of States and new UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon will fail the people of Darfur if they do not take concrete steps to herald the start of a new chapter in the region and ensure an immediate ceasefire is both agreed and adhered to.
Oxfam is receiving reports from its partner organisations in Somalia that nomadic herdsmen have been hit in recent bombing raids. According to the reports from local organisations in Afmadow district, bombs have hit vital water sources as well as large groups of nomads and their animals who had gathered around large fires at night to ward off mosquitoes.
Two years on from the tsunami, international aid agency Oxfam is helping 1.2 million people affected by the disaster.
A wave of violence has forced the temporary evacuation of over 400 humanitarian staff in eastern Chad in the past two weeks, severely interrupting the provision of humanitarian aid, says international agency Oxfam. The serious deterioration of security in the region bordering Darfur threatens to cause a major health and food crisis for hundreds of thousands of people.