MOGADISHU: Hard-line Islamist insurgents in Somalia have intensified their campaign to stop humanitarian supplies being distributed by the World Food Program (WFP) by issuing tough warnings against people who work with the aid agency, officials said.
The group has confiscated tons of food-aid in the past 24 hours from local traders they accused of being contracted by WFP. They also burned some of the food they collected from warehouses in Mogadishu.
"The WFP wants to poison our people but we will never allow it," Sheik Ali Mohamed Hussein, a senior Shebab official in Mogadishu charged.
"Our forces have collected the expired grain from warehouses in the town where local traders stored it and we destroyed it", he said. Hussein also warned people to avoid food with WFP markings or risk punishment.
"We warn all traders and residents in Mogadishu to stay away from WFP foods. Anyone found with WFP market supplies in his possession will face punishment", he added.
Islamist insurgents raided nearly 30 warehouses in Beldweyn town, some 400 km north of Mogadishu, confiscating food they said belonged to the WFP. They also captured a convoy of food aid on its way from central Somalia to villages in the region.
"They raided the warehouses in the town and took the keys from the owners. They told us all the food stored there belonged to WFP but that is not true", Hersi Ali, a local trader said.
"They took nearly twenty trucks loaded with food-aid coming from central Somalia in the past two days. The trucks are now in the police station where Shebab insurgents are guarding them", another trader who asked not to be named said.
The Al-Qaeda inspired Shebab insurgents have banned the WFP from operating in southern regions of the country which they control.
