UNITED NATIONS – The United Nations has temporarily suspended aid deliveries in Nigeria’s northeastern state of Borno, the former stronghold of Boko Haram militants, after a humanitarian convoy was attacked and two people injured, the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF said on Thursday.
UNICEF said unknown assailants attacked the convoy on Thursday as it returned from delivery aid. Severely malnourished children are dying in large numbers in northeast Nigeria, where food supplies are close to running out, Medecins Sans Frontieres said on Wednesday.
The medical charity, also known as Doctors Without Borders, had previously urged the United Nations to set up emergency food transports to the area, where up to 800,000 civilians have been cut off for over a year, it said.
“The situation is a large-scale humanitarian disaster…. There is a vital need to have a food pipeline in place to save the population that can be saved,” MSF general director Bruno Jochum told a news briefing.
“We are talking at least about pockets of what is close to a famine.”
MICHELLE NICHOLS
