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An international aid group says East Africa is facing the worst humanitarian crisis in 10 years. The Britain-based agency, Oxfam, says climate change is leading to extreme drought, killing cattle and threatening lives throughout the region. The agency is appealing for millions of dollars for emergency relief.
Speaking to VOA from Nairobi, Oxfam's East Africa Director Paul Smith Lomas says in some regions adequate rainfall has not come for three years. The worst affected countries, he says, are Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia, and Uganda.
"There are very distressing levels of malnutrition," he said. "We know that in northern Kenya, for example, the level of malnutrition amongst children is beyond what is defined as an emergency level. In Somalia almost one in six children are seen to be acutely malnourished."
He says hundreds of thousands of cattle are dying, destroying a big source of income. Herders on the hunt for grassland, he says, are roaming outside their normal pastures, leading to fierce competition for resources. Oxfam says this has led to 65 deaths in northern Kenya since June.
Lomas says rains are expected this month.
"We are predicting that these could be rains better than average which of course would