Deadly fighting has again engulfed Baidoa in Somalia’s South West State, killing and wounding children in a city where families were already struggling to survive severe hunger, displacement and compounding crises.
A health facility has also been damaged, the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, and other humanitarian agencies reported.
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Over recent weeks, Baidoa, the state’s largest city, has seen clashes between Government forces and fighters aligned with the former regional president, who was ousted in March.
The army has been trying to hold the city after taking control earlier this year. News reports said the latest surge in hostilities erupted on Monday, after thousands of local fighters entered Baidoa that morning.
“Children are once again bearing the heaviest burden of violence,” said the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, expressing deep concern about the escalation.
“UNICEF calls on all parties to protect children from harm, ensure the protection of schools, and health facilities, and allow safe and unhindered humanitarian access.”
Decades of humanitarian crisis
The renewed violence is unfolding in a place already gripped by a profound humanitarian emergency.
Somalia has endured decades of food insecurity, fuelled by repeated conflict, large-scale displacement, disruptions to global trade and extreme climate shocks, including severe droughts and floods.
Across the country, two million children are acutely or severely malnourished, making Somalia one of the world’s largest malnutrition crises, according to UN agencies.
In Baidoa alone, 26,000 people are facing catastrophic food insecurity — the highest level on the hunger scale — leaving them at risk of famine.
The stronger-than-ever El Niño weather pattern is expected to worsen conditions by intensifying the October-December rainy season.
Overlapping crises
For families in Baidoa and beyond, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said, these overlapping emergencies have shattered ordinary life.
Hawo’s family is among those caught in the turmoil.
Some days we eat just once a day
A mortar first struck their family home in Baidoa, killing her father. Her brother later died in the fighting. Hawo fled to Mogadishu with her daughter and now shelters there with her aunt.
“Even with my aunt’s support I have been struggling, but sometimes it is really bad,” she said. “Some days we eat just once a day.”
Her daughter, Farhiya, grew listless, lost her appetite and began losing weight.
A neighbour urged Hawo to go to the Weido clinic, but the facility has been turning away women and children because it lacks resources.
“I hope I can get the support I need for my child to recover,” Hawo said, as aid workers warned that conditions may deteriorate further.
© UNICEF/Mohamed Yasin Makeshift shelters stretch across displacement camps in Baidoa, Somalia.
Aid drying up
WFP, which anchors Somalia’s wider food aid response, is under mounting pressure as humanitarian funding cuts sharply limit its reach.
After supporting more than four million people each month just a few years ago, the agency can now provide food assistance to only just over 670,000 people.
“In 2022, when Somalia was experiencing its longest drought in 40 years, timely and generous funding helped scale up assistance to avert famine,” explained Hameed Nuru, WFP Country Director in Somalia.
“Today, severe funding shortfalls mean we are only reaching a fraction of those in need, forcing us to make painful choices about who receives assistance and who does not,” he said.
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