Australians supporting the UN Refugee Agency

Our Stories
ERT when disaster strikes

When disaster strikes, UNHCR is there, on the ground, saving lives within 72 hours. Help us be there every time.



UNHCR logo

Frequently asked questions about UNHCR.



Subscribe toour eNewsletter

 
Subscribe

Photo Gallery Faces of Famine

As thousands of Somali refugees continue to seek shelter and medical assistance in UNHCR camps in Kenya (Dadaab) and Ethiopia (Dollo Ado), the desperation of the new arrivals becomes more and more apparent.

Camps are being extended as they overflow with refugees and UNHCR Emergency Response staff are working day and night to accomodate for the sudden and unrelenting influx of those fleeing conflict and famine.

Tens of thousands of refugees have fled their homes and, in some cases, have walked for weeks in search of food, medical services and a safe haven. They arrive emaciated from hunger and are extremely weak. These are the faces of famine.

Portrait of a Somali refugee in Ifo extention. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Somali refugees dig the grave of Ibrahim Issack, a 6-year old child who died of complications of severe malnutrition a month after arriving in the camp, according to his Uncle Hassan Issack. "We fled Buaale and travelled for 21 days by foot. It was very tiresome. We walked through drought with no food and little water. Along the way we were robbed and women were raped. They were attacked between after crossing the border into Kenya and utensils, matresses and money were stollen.UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011A new arrival from Somalia in the therapeutic feeding center at the GIZ hospital in Ifo camp. There are three wards for malnourished children at the hospital up from one in pervious years. Drought and famine have forced tens of thousands of refugees to flee from Somalia in the last 2 months./ UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Young girls and women wait to collect water from a water point in Ifo extention. UNHCR began moving families form the self-settled areas at the outskirts of the camp to Ifo extention in July, 2011. In Ifo extention it will be easier for water, sanitation and security services to be delivered. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Two infants wait as a medical officer prepares to give a polio vaccinations during immunization and health screening at the reception center for newly arrived Somali refugees in Ifo camp. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011A new arrival from Somalia holds her child in the therapeutic feeding center at the GIZ hospital in Ifo camp. There are three wards for malnourished children at the hospital up from one in pervious years. Drought and famine have forced tens of thousands of refugees to flee from Somalia in the last 2 months. / UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Somali refugees. 20 year-old Abdi Hassan, a nomadic camel herder was beaten to a point of paralysis by al-Shabaab soldiers when he refused to allow them to take some of his camels as a tax. He fled Salagale by road with his wife and other relatives to Ifo Camp, near Dadaab, Kenya in May 2010. He has been in the hospital since arriving in Kenya. UNHCR/Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Protection officer Mehreen Afzal expediting registration for a handicapped refugee frrom Hagar, Somalia on the day of her arrival with her family. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Two sisters exhausted immediately after arrival at the reception center for newly arrived refugees in Ifo camp. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Somali boy at a water point in Ifo extention.UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011UNHCR prepares tents for refugee families that will be transfered from self settled areas around Ifo camp to a more formally organized settlement in Ifo extention where it will be easier for water, sanitation and security services to be delivered. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011UNHCR prepares tents for refugee families that will be transfered from self settled areas around Ifo camp to a more formally organized settlement in Ifo extention where it will be easier for water, sanitation and security services to be delivered. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Somali refugee Shamsha Adan rests on apile of sticks she will use to construct a tukol in the Ifo extension after moving from the outskirts of Ifo, one of three towns in the refugee camp complex near Dadaab, Kenya. Over 40,000 refugees arrived since the start of June bringing the estimated population of the camps to 440,000 people. A steady stream of refugees have fled to the camp to avoid the devastating consequences of drought and famine in Somalia in recent months. UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011A Somali refugee resting outside his new tent in Ifo extension on the day of his transfer from a self-settled area at the edge of Ifo camp. UNHCR is transferring families at a rate of 300 per day from the self-settled areas at the edges of Ifo camp to the new tented camp area./ UNHCR/ Brendan Bannon/ August 2011Unaccompanied male refugees are fingerprinted and wrist-banded and entered into a data base at the reception center in Ifo camp, part of the sprawling refugee camps near dadaab, kenya. UNHCR/Brendan Bannon/ August 2011