Letter: Hidden stories behind Somalia's suffering

Sir: Following Steve Boggan's article on Somalia ('Ministers 'to attack' EC security aid plan', 3 September), the EC must not be allowed to get away with the myth that only one-third of 185,000 tonnes of cereal has been able to reach its destination because of internal problems in Somalia. I have no evidence that the EC has attempted to send anywhere near 60,000 tonnes this year. Where is that evidence? The food has not got there because it has not been sent. The EC, including the British government, has been culpable because it has ignored Somalia, although it was warned in May 1991 of the huge crisis ahead.

When food has been sent, heroic efforts by the Red Cross, Care and Save the Children have ensured that the great bulk has been delivered. Even when the food has been 'diverted', it went to a Somali who would otherwise have been hungry. Returning from my visit to Somalia two weeks ago, I left on the only relief plane that was known to be operating at that time. It was delivering food successfully in Mogadishu and Baidoa. But why was it the only plane, and not from the EC? What was the EC doing? A single Hercules donated from each EC country would have made a huge impact on the famine in the interior of Somalia.

The great scandal is that Britain and the EC turned their backs on Somalia. Britain's interests in Somalia are looked after by the High Commission in Nairobi. It turned its back on the world's greatest humanitarian crisis. No diplomat has visited Mogadishu or any of the famine areas in Somalia during the whole of this year. How has Britain been kept in touch? There is no embassy of any EC country in Somalia. When Lady Chalker belatedly visits Somalia in the middle of this month, she will find that thousands of Somalis have died because of incompetence by the UN and EC governments, including her own.

The internal problems of Somalia are huge. But the reason that Somalis have not been eating is overwhelmingly because of the incompetence of the aid effort.

Yours faithfully,

TONY WORTHINGTON

MP for Clydebank and Milngavie (Lab)

House of Commons

London, SW1

3 September

The writer is Labour spokesman on overseas development.