High-profile medical aid mission group gives up, citing unhelpful 'civilian authorities' and too many attacks and risks. Latest kidnapping was the 'last straw.'
The international aid agency Doctors Without Borders is to permanently close its operations in Somalia because of repeated “extreme attacks” that it says the country’s authorities are doing little to curb
The move came as a surprise, and contradicts popular perceptions of growing stability and reconstruction in Somalia that have been carefully crafted by the new government and its international donors.
It also threatens a new period in the troubled nation in which many civilians in rural areas that relied on the famous aid group may be left bereft.
“In choosing to kill, attack, and abduct humanitarian aid workers, armed groups, and the civilian authorities who tolerate their actions, have sealed the fate of countless lives in Somalia,” said Unni Karunakara, the international president of the organization – known by its French acronym MSF, or Médecins Sans Frontières – in a statement.
“We have reached the point where I just don’t see the recognition of the value of impartial humanitarian assistance in Somalia anymore,” he says.
“We’re not therefore able to put our staff in places where they can work. The risks and the compromises that we must make are too high.”
WESTERN AID AGENCIES WASTED BILLIONS ON TRYING TO HELP SOMALIS IT'S TIME THEY LEARNED THAT YOU CANNOT HELP THOSE WHO DON'T WANT TO BE HELPED.READ MORE.
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/2013/0814/Doctors-Without-Borders-leaving-Somalia-after-20-plus-years-frustrated
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