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UN: 258 million people faced acute food insecurity in 2022

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More than a quarter-billion people in 58 countries faced acute food insecurity last year because of conflicts, climate change, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine, according to a report published Wednesday.

The Global Report on Food Crises, an alliance of humanitarian organizations founded by the U.N. and European Union, said people faced starvation and death in seven of those countries: Somalia, Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Haiti, Nigeria, South Sudan and Yemen.

The report found that that the number of people facing acute food insecurity and requiring urgent food aid — 258 million — had increased for the fourth consecutive year, a “stinging indictment of humanity’s failure” to implement U.N. goals to end world hunger, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said.

While the increase last year was due in part to more populations being analyzed, the report also found that the severity of the problem increased as well, “highlighting a concerning trend of a deterioration.”

Rein Paulsen, director of emergencies and resilience for the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, said an interplay of causes was driving hunger. They include conflicts, climate shocks, the impact of the pandemic and consequences of Russia’s war in Ukraine that has had an impact on the global trade in fertilizers, wheat, maize and sunflower oil, The Associated Press reported.

The impact has been most acute on the poorest countries that are dependent on food imports. “Prices have increased (and) those countries have been adversely affected,” Paulsen said.

He called for a “paradigm shift” so that more funding is spent investing in agricultural interventions that anticipate food crises and aim to prevent them.

“The challenge that we have is the disequilibrium, the mismatch that exists between the amount of funding money that’s given, what that funding is spent on, and the types of interventions that are required to make a change,” he said.

The U.N. World Food Program’s new chief issued a warning that the Rome-based agency’s resources to provide food aid amid the surging needs are “running dangerously low.” Executive Director Cindy McCain told panelists at an event to present the report that the agency could be forced to make “heart-breaking decisions to slash” assistance if substantial new funding doesn’t materialize quickly.

McCain noted that she had just returned from Somalia, where, she said, “millions are teetering on the edge of hunger and catastrophe.” She also said: “We all know it doesn’t have to be that way.”

Acute food insecurity is when a person’s inability to consume adequate food puts their lives or livelihoods in immediate danger.

The EU’s commissioner for international partnership, Jutta Urpilainen, said that the bloc’s strategy to fight hunger includes supporting initiatives aimed to “boost local production and reduce dependence on unsustainable imports.”

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Pakistan delivered ‘strong and clear message’ to IEA: PM Shehbaz Sharif

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Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Saturday once again raised concerns that militant activities continue to emanate from the Afghan territory.

“It is our earnest desire to live in peace with them (Afghanistan) for all times to come. Unfortunately, despite our best and sincere efforts, terrorist activities continue to emanate from Afghan territory,” he said during said at a military academy.

Recalling Deputy PM Ishaq Dar’s recent visit to Kabul, Shehbaz Sharif asserted: “We shall continue our efforts to have better relations and understanding with our brotherly and neighbourly country Afghanistan.

He said that Pakistan has “delivered a strong and clear message” to the Islamic Emirate that while it desire peaceful neighbourly relations with Kabul, this cannot happen as long as the Afghan soil is being used by militants to attack Pakistanis.

Pakistani officials have repeatedly claimed that the attacks in the country have their roots in Afghanistan. The Islamic Emirate, however, has denied the allegations, stressing that it will not allow Afghanistan’s territory to be used against the security of other countries.

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U.S. aid cuts are impacting millions of Afghans: IRC

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For 23 million Afghans, U.S. aid funding has been a critical lifeline, but that support is now in jeopardy, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) aid organization said on Friday.

Funding cuts are already having devastating impacts on the country’s most vulnerable communities, especially women and children, IRC said in an article.

IRC said that due to cuts in U.S, aid funding, it has been forced to suspend some of our life-saving services in Afghanistan.

“As a result, over 700,000 people, including refugees and displaced families, will lose access to essential humanitarian services from IRC programming alone,” IRC said, “Life-saving treatment for more than 15,000 young children suffering from malnutrition has been disrupted.”

The organization noted that Afghanistan is facing a severe humanitarian crisis, with over 22.9 million people in urgent need of aid.

“Decades of conflict, a prolonged economic crisis, and environmental disasters have pushed millions into poverty and left more than one in three Afghans food insecure,” it said.

IRC said that the situation is especially dire for vulnerable groups, including over 3 million children and 1.2 million pregnant or nursing mothers suffering from acute malnutrition.

Across the country, more than 14 million people have limited or no access to health care. Communities are losing access to clean drinking water and basic sanitation services, creating a higher risk of disease outbreaks that could potentially spread across international borders, it said.

IRC warned that without renewed funding, countless families risk falling deeper into hunger, illness and poverty.

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IEA’s condemnation of Kashmir attack ‘encouraging’: Khalilzad

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Former US special envoy for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, said on Friday that the Islamic Emirate’s condemnation of the attack on tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir was an “encouraging development”.

“In an encouraging development, the Taliban (IEA) have sided with the tourist victims in Kashmir and have denounced this terror attack,” Khalilzad said on X.

Twenty-six people were killed in a shooting in a tourist area in Pahalgam, Kashmir, on Tuesday.

The attack has escalated tensions between India and Pakistan, with the two countries taking measures against each other.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan condemned the attack and said that such incidents threaten the security and stability of the region.

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