Welcome to the press briefing of the Information Service in Geneva at the UN.
Here for our last briefing of the year 2025, I would like to give immediately the floor to our first speaker who has been brought by Eugene.
We have the pleasure to have with us Brigitte Mukanga Ino, who's the UNHCR representative in Burundi.
Madam, you're joining from Bujumbura and to tell us about the islands is in Eastern TRC.
You want to start Eugene and then we give to the floor to Beatrice.
Thank you for joining today's briefing.
I'm bringing our representative in Burundi.
But first of all, let me just highlight the escalating of violence in South Kivu in the Democratic Republic of Congo, already displaced 500,000 Congolese internally.
And you will hear more about the those who cross the border to Burundi and then their dire humanitarian situation.
And if you have any question on the situation in DRC, I'm happy to answer after the briefing of our representative.
Representative, the floor is yours.
As you just stated, the escalation of violence in the Eastern Congo, particularly in South Kiru, started around end of beginning of this December.
And since then we have received here in Burundi the Government of Burundi, UNHCR and other humanitarian partners.
We have received as of yesterday evening more than 4084 thousand new arrival and this is the the highest influx that Burundi is experiencing.
You would remember that at the beginning of the year already following the the crisis in Goma and Kafu, Burundi received over 70,000 people then plus those who have been living in the country.
So currently Burundi is receiving over 200,000 Congolese refugees.
This is quite high for the capacities here in Burundi, which is quite limited.
We have seen over the past few days and this escalation and the increased number of people who are crossing into Burundi, many of them who are coming by foot, but also as the, the the the fight has continued going down.
We started receiving first dose from the northern part of Burundi at the border with Camanola.
That was the first group that came this early December and close to 30,000 of them were putting aside, which is just across Camanola.
And then as the flight was evolving towards Uvira, we started also receiving a new border area which is Gatumba.
So around Gatumba, we have more than 25,000 people who have been received from there and for the past few days as the fight continues on the side of Fizzy and Baraka, which is exactly opposite on the Burundi side.
So on that side people are coming through by using boats and some of these boats are just in very bad conditions and one of them actually capsized 2 days ago, creating some some people who were drowned.
The refugees who are arriving very much exhaust, many of them have after working for many days before reaching Burundi, both women, children, elderly people and most vulnerable people who are crossing.
They are coming really in a very exhaust condition for working for days.
But also some of them are telling us that they have been living already in internally displaced camps inside Congo.
For those ones they are bringing actually even some of the torn tents that they are putting up on arrival in Burundi.
But it's still very difficult.
The conditions, living conditions are very bad.
We are in raining season here in Burundi and without the necessary shelters, we don't have the the the shelters as the situation is evolving to provide for this, for the new arrival, we and that is exposing people actually to even harsh condition, weather condition.
And we have started observing cases of cholera which have been declared and confirmed by the Ministry of Health.
And in fact this afternoon we are having another meeting on the cholera outbreak which is being observed in most of the sites where refugees have been established.
The government has provided, has provided a new site which is away from the borders with the DRC so that this the new refugees can be established in in the new site.
The site is in the eastern part of Burundi.
It's called Boeru in Brigi Province.
And so we have started the relocation of the refugees to the new site.
So far about 21,000 people have been already transferred to to Guero sites.
But even the site itself is still under development, is still lacking the essential, essential services that the refugees need as they arrive at the site.
So on, 2 days ago, on the 17th, this December, the government of Burundi, through the Ministry of Interior and the Humanitarian coordinator and all UN agencies launched an international call for solidarity for the, the, the, the response to this humanitarian situation.
So there's an appeal that has been launched for the value of 35,035 million U.S.
dollars, which would try to help to provide the necessary protection and assistance to the new arrival into Burundi.
And as my colleague Eugene just said, apart from those who are coming into Burundi, we are seeing a large displacement, internal displacement on the Congo side.
And in our coordination meetings with colleagues in Congo, they are telling us that indeed the there's a large number of over 500,000 new displacement inside Congo.
The other thing we have seen with the refugees, particularly those who are in Gatumba area, some of them would like to return as soon as possible, hoping that the discussion that is taking place, the various negotiations in Congo, hoping that that that would yield some results so that they can return as soon as possible.
Because this most of them are people who have been government workers and traders, etcetera, who would like to go back.
Meanwhile, for those who came from the rural areas and who have been already in IDP camps, many of them are saying that they they don't feel that they can return now.
They don't they, they, they, they are still hesitant because of the many displacements they have been going going through before this current situation.
Generally for Burundi, the situation is quite overwhelming.
The number of refugees in Burundi is quite high compared to the capacity of the country, The services which are not available, the outbreak of disease that is coming up with this emergency, we really need some support.
We need resources in order to to put up the necessary shelter and provide assistance.
As I was saying, it is raining season and people living just in the open because it's really the health condition is deteriorating quite fast and we need, we need support from everyone.
Thank you very much, Bridget for this update.
I'm opening the floor to questions now in the room.
No online I see MFR Reuters.
You use the word overwhelming for Burundi.
What is your appraisal of the government's patience with this situation?
Do you think there's any risk of them closing the border if they don't get the support?
And a couple of clarifications.
Why can you not get the adequate shelter?
Is it funding or logistics or both?
And secondly, you mentioned 500,000 internally displaced within Congo.
Since when have those people been displaced, please?
Yes, overwhelming is because Burundi itself is having another pressure with the return of Burundians who are coming from Tanzania but also other neighbouring countries.
And recently there was a tripartite meeting with the government of Tanzania, Burundi and UNHCR during which Tanzania clearly stated that they have to accelerate the return of of Burundians.
And we have been receiving thousands of Burundians who are returning as well.
And the resources in the country are not Burundi is having its own economic challenges.
So the, the, the capacity to absorb both the, the, the large number of returnees and the Congolese refugees, the capacity is quite limited.
The services are not, are not available.
That's why for, for the refugees at least, the humanitarian community, the international, the appeal, the flash appeal that was launched is going to help to support the, the refugees, but also the host communities so that we can avoid clashes over the limited resources that's available in the country.
The risk of closing the border.
Yes, the borders are already officially closed, but they just left a kind of corridor to allow the, the, the refugees, the people who are fleeing from from Congo to come into Burundi.
But officially the borders are already closed at, at Ghatuma.
The funding is really the, the, the, the major issue here, both UNHCR and other humanitarian actors, we have been experiencing a very difficult financial situation since the beginning of this year and in 2025 alone.
This is the second time Burundi is facing this large influx of refugees.
So the resources are overstretched.
And yes, that's the main, that's why we are not in a position to provide the necessary shelter or even the water or sanitation in these these sites which have been created by the influx.
The conditions are really difficult.
No sanitation, the number of bladders to provide water is, is very limited.
The queues, the children and women, they are queuing for, for hours to, to get some water.
Same for the shelter and, and even the foods.
So we, we hope, we hope really that with the Flash appeal there could be some response as soon as possible because to, to avoid the, the condition from going from bad to worse.
There was a response from ECHO.
We got three million U.S.
dollars out of the the, the 35,035 thousand, 35 million requested for the Burundi, Burundi situation, which has just helped in recreating in creating this site to which is a kind of safety area for people who are running from from Congo.
Thank you very much, Bridget.
I yes, sorry when I no, because I want to answer the last question about DRC displacement.
Yes, so 5500 thousand, the new displacement inside of ADRC is since the 2nd of December and among them 200,000 Congolese are in Uvira territory.
They are displaced within the Uvira territory and also remind you that there is a currently 5.3 million Congolese internally displace and among them a 3.6 millionaire in the Eastern DRC and also in addition 1.1 million Congolese hosted in neighbouring country.
Thank you, Jean, I've seen you've distributed the notes, but these numbers would probably be also very useful if you can share them.
These days there has been an announced that the troops of the AIM 23 were withdrawing from the city of Ubera.
I wanted to know if you have teams on the ground that could verify the situation with the current without withdrawal and also if you have testimonies from people that were there and that have none have left the city.
Yes, we, we are still conducting protection monitoring activities and border monitoring.
But on the Burundi side and so far the information that we have is only what the refugees can tell us, particularly those who are just coming.
As of yesterday and even this morning, we are still receiving some boats of with with people who are running from the Fizzy and Baraka area in the South Kivu.
They are telling us that the fight is still continuing in those areas.
It's not the city of Uvira per SE, but it's South of Uvira where Fizzy and Baraka that the fight is still ongoing and that's why we are still receiving boats every day.
As of yesterday evening, there were almost 12 boats with with new arrival.
So the official information on announcing the, the, the, the withdrawal of M23, maybe that is around the city of Ovira, but in inland, I think the fight is still ongoing, which is leading to this continuous displacement from those areas.
I don't see other question for you, Brigitte.
Thanks, Eugene to be with us today and thanks to Brigitte for this briefing.
Let's sorry, that's main in Africa and go now to IOM.
Maybe you want to introduce yourself because I think it's the first time you come to the briefing and introduce your colleague from Port Sudan that I can see has joined, but we know him, but maybe you want to introduce you and him.
I'm glad to be with you here today in this briefing, a very important one indeed on the situation in Sudan, particularly the latest development trends in Darfur and S Kordovan regions.
As AIM has communicated in its press materials, these areas in particular continue to experience increasing displacement and as a result, increasing humanitarian needs indeed.
And I'm pleased to be joined today by my colleague, Dr Mohammed Rifat, our Chief of Mission in Sudan, who is going to connect shortly and provide you, yeah, great, with the latest displacement figures and humanitarians and also the broader situation on the ground.
And yeah, without further ado, over to you, Mohammed.
It's a pleasure always to be with you.
And I know it's the end of the year and my solidarity with colleagues from Burundi as well.
And I wish you all a good vacation time before I start.
I promise I will be very short.
I know you have all heard a lot about Sudan, but I really wanted just to join to send a very clear 2 messages.
One of them will focus on Cordovan and the other is about the returns.
But before we start, I just would like to remind everyone that Sudan remains the largest global displacement as we speak now.
We still have around 9.3 million internally displaced within Sudan.
I remember early this year when I first joined in one of my first briefings this year with you, we were talking around almost 11.9.
So we have a little bit of hope here to speak about and I will come to this point later.
But today I'm talking because we are all concerned about what happened around Fisher on the 25th of October.
We all start seeing the horrific videos we hear about the news of displacement and we as IOM through our displacement tracking metrics has counted more than 109,000 who have managed to flee the city of and it's surrounding villages.
Those are still many of them are still stuck in the neighbouring villages, not able to move further because of logistic security issues that we are all aware about.
Unfortunately, we have failed to reach for many reasons like ceasefire or peace agreement and our access remains very challenged even after the visit of high senior officials of the ERC to Fletcher.
We still all have the challenges on seeing and understanding what exactly happened in a fashion.
But again, I will not focus today on fashion.
But my first message is about cordovan and what's happening now in cordovan.
Until now, since the 25th of October, we have seen more and more escalation of hostilities in alpha, in Cordovans.
And we have counted more than 50,000 who have been displaced since the 25th of October from Cordovan alone.
And cordovan, I mean the main, main states of Cordovans, we have seen this cross-border movement going to South Sudan.
Just between the 4th and the 10th of 4th, sorry, the 4th and the 15th of of this month, we have counted over 3 point three, 3300 who have crossed to South Sudan.
Those displacement from Cordovan are not happening sporadically.
They are happening because people are scared.
They are fleeing from areas in Babanusa, areas around Kadugli, around Ubayid, and those are still those who are lucky to flee and they start arriving in areas in White Knight, in, in Kadarif.
And they are arriving only women and children, which is also alarming about the protection.
That's the protection issues that's happening in those areas.
With this in numbers from North Korea to Van alone, we counted more than 40,000 ID.
I'm talking about from South Cordovan almost 10,000 IDP and from West Cordovan around 250, we remain very alarmed by this displacement, not because only of the scale, but what if this becomes an excellent fasher and this is what we need to avoid.
We need to avoid through trying to silence the guns and we need to avoid through our preparedness and being ready on the humanitarian side and protection side.
Today we received the shipment and donation from the Turkish government more than 30,000 tenths.
We are seeing more and more non traditional donors coming.
We are seeing support for also from our traditional donors, from the US government, from ECHO, from the EU.
But this will never be enough if we see another thousands and hundreds of thousands of displacement.
So this is my first message about cordovan.
We have a situation that we need to avoid that escalate into another fashion On the return file.
As I mentioned earlier, we have more than 2.6 ID PS who opted to return over the last maybe 8-9 months.
We have a moment of hope where every month we have seen decline in the number of ID PS within Sudan but this is also rapidly vanishing as we have seen people more and more hesitant to return.
We have seen attacks on civil infrastructures just yesterday or the day before.
We have seen big attack on one of the power station in Adbar.
Many of the states have went dark because of this attacks.
Now the question that all the population have is my return safe?
Should I return or should I not return?
We see in the social media all the news about new attacks in states like Al Jazeera, like Sinnar, like Qadarif, even like Tawila where it hosts 550,000.
And we remain very alarmed.
And if those attacks materialise, if people get scared again, if they opt to get this place again, those speculation would be very hesitant no matter how much we try to convince them to return back, that we return.
The people of Sudan have opted to return because we had hope.
And now we are seeing that with a continuous attacks on the states that we even consider safe or partially safe or relatively safe, that they have opted to return of an entry.
They might not feel the same level of safety that they had couple of months ago.
Let alone the lack of services that we are all aware about.
Water, electricity, basic healthcare services are all almost absent.
So if we see new wave of large displacement within Sudan, this will go definitely more protracted and it will it will definitely go beyond Sudan and it would have its original impact.
My last message is half of those new displacement that we saw from Cordova and our children.
It's alarming for the future of Sudan and for the situation we see here.
My last, last message is people in Sudan are not moving by choice.
They are running just to find safety.
So we count on all member states, we count on everyone who can provide support for Sudan to provide them safety.
And again, it's a pleasure to be with you all.
Thank you very much, Mohammed, for this update.
The situation continues to be extremely, extremely dire and before I give the floor to the journalist, just would like to remind everybody that with just a couple of week weeks to go until the end of the year, the humanitarian response plan for Sudan is only 36% funded with 1.5 billion received out of the 4.2 billion required.
We urgently call on donors to step up support, to step up support to close the funding gap and sustain life saving assistance.
And I open the floor to question now in the room if there are any hands up.
So let's go to the platform, John Zarro, Costas, Francois Katter and then answer it.
I was wondering and it's relevant to Sudan, given the big cuts in your budget announced in the closed door meeting of the Council, I think last week, which programmes are you cutting back drastically and does that include Sudan, does that include Libya?
Which countries are you cutting back and which are you trying to limit cutting back because of the urgency of the needs?
So we'll ask Mohammed to, to maybe answer, but he I don't know if you can only answer for Sudan or in general for the other programmes.
Yeah, I, I think your question is mainly about the overall IOM budget cuts.
I can I can talk about Sudan and I can tell you that since this year we have lost almost 83 million of our funding.
And this figure had LED that we have to use our capacity on the ground massively.
And because of this, we have went also through many of our advocacy plan with our non traditional donors and we managed to get some level of solidarity.
But I will go through the solidarity that we got.
But let me first remind you that because of those cuts, we have to choose which lives we can save and which support we have to stop.
So we would go crossing places where we know that people are absolutely in dire needs, but we will leave them and not be able to help them because we have to prioritise those who are absolutely dying.
We have managed to survive our displacement tracking metrics because it's one of the programmes that's all the Internet systems counting on when it comes to needs assessment and number of displacement.
We are keeping our common pipeline for non food items and shelter items up and running and active because of the generous support we're still getting from different member states.
But also we have to reduce our support to many of the local NGOs.
NGOs, many of the grant management programmes that we were providing health projects and by clinics have closed and we have to let go a couple of hundreds of colleagues from our workforce.
But also we have a glimpse of hope.
So I will see that the UN80 and the UN reset is really a good, we have here good examples that how we made this work in Sudan.
And if you allow me in one minutes, I will give you the story of the donation just received.
So the government of Turkey and any top was here like 3 months, 3 weeks ago and she was in our empty warehouse for our shelter items and she made a call for all Member states to support us.
We received several response to this call.
One of them was from the Turkish government in kind donation of 30,000 tenth.
But also we received support from the Sudan Humanitarian Fund to ship this kind of in kind donation from Turkey to here.
And we are working with other NGOs and NGO partners and the Sudanese authority on the distribution to the last miles in Towila in areas impacted in Cordovan.
So we have managed somehow to and of course we got also some U.S.
government money to support the transportation within Sudan.
So this is a good example where we are really getting all the elements from non traditional donors to traditional donors to the UN system to other ultra supporting to our kings INGOSNGOS to get the system work together.
The last thing is that this is definitely not enough and we are responding to them increasing need.
As you saw the needs shifted from 27 million to 33 million this year compared to 27 last year.
So the needs are increasing and the resources are less, but we are definitely getting better in working things.
But we are far from matching the needs who are just reserving on the on the ground especially protection.
Thank you Avan on other crisis.
As my colleague Mohammed mentioned, unfortunately the situation is not only unique to to Sudan.
We face similar challenges in in a lot of other countries, Libya included, where you know, it needs continue increasing and we are extremely stretched when it comes to resources unfortunately.
And this means that we will have to prioritise even within the the groups that are who are most vulnerable.
And that unfortunately means that a lot of people who need critical assistance are not going to be able to receive it.
And so we continue to appeal to the international community to step up its support and ensure that these crises are not forgotten.
I mentioned Libya, there's also protracted displacement crises in, in a lot of other places like Yemen.
We continue also having crises also in, in countries that are impacted by the impact impacted by disasters.
And yeah, with, I think that's, that's all from my side.
It's a question concerning the the cuts 83 millions cuts you have mentioned for the phoning for Sudan.
How much of these, if you could specify the percentage of the decrease that were that can be associated with which country, I mean which countries main countries decided to cut the phoning?
Is it the the US the the the main one or others if you could specify, specify that and then I have other questions, but on other related issues and to other organisations.
Mohammed or you want to take that yes, maybe no, I can take that specific insurance on Sudan and I can you have to it's on, it's on.
OK, Mohammed on, on, on the Sudan part of it of the question.
Yeah, definitely, No, definitely we had before I respond on the percentage, just also remember that the overall global appeal for the Sudan response is only around 33 or 30, slightly above 30% funded.
I am now we are almost at 35% funded and from the cuts that we got, it was as you know there are several Member States who have reduced to has decided to reduce external contribution or review them including the US and other member States.
The big chunk for IOM was definitely the US government, but also we saw later on an activation of percentage of this fund and most recently also to be very, let's say not very optimistic, but we see glimpse of external support coming.
So we see it also another maybe around like good percentage of around 9 million to support us with the shelter items and non food items.
But this is leave the shelter cluster at the gap of around maybe eighty 8787%.
So the whole shelter cluster in the UN now is between 11 and 1213% funded, which is a huge gap even compared to the other clusters within Sudan.
So you see other health cluster wash food are maybe around the 30%, forty percent, 50% funded.
The the shelter, which is the main thing that people who are recently displaced remains the most, I would say, underfunded in the in Sudan currently.
Again, a lot of these crises remain severely underfunded as my colleague Mohammed mentioned.
And there's been a general trend that unfortunately we've been noticing, which is the the funding decline from a lot of the the member states.
But we continue to work closely with with the donors and also our member States and partners to advocate that these crises are not forgotten because it's more important than ever that we continue supporting these people in need to prevent further escalation in the region.
Thank you, Emma Reuters, good morning.
I was wondering if you can tell us who is actually fighting in Kordovan.
I've seen reports that the Sudan People's Liberation Movement, N is also involved, as well as obviously the RSF and the Sudanese army.
And there's also increasing talk of mercenaries, Colombians.
I'm wondering if any of the displaced people have been able to testify.
And in your view, how likely is it that El obeyed?
Hope my pronunciation is OK.
And what would be the impact of that?
I have no data who's who's fighting there.
We know definitely that it's the traditional actors in this area, but who's fighting where, It's not part of the data that we collect.
But I can tell you that for us Kadugli, we estimate that there is around 90 to 100,000 people in this area will be displaced if something happened, if the fighting continue.
If they get access to these as a city in a low by it, which seems to be also maybe one or two steps from being the next city under attack that we estimate more than half a million are already going to be impacted.
As you have seen also recently that attack on UNESFA base and it's also another area where we are very alarmed about trends of attacks and hostilities even on UN infrastructures.
It definitely LED also to casualties within the UNESFA soldiers, which we are very concerned and deeply sad about it.
So it's also another trend that we need to remind everyone that respect of human rights and principles of engagement need to be very well concerned, very well considered in this kind of conflict.
So this is what we really know in terms of the impact of the displacement in the areas where the fighting might be escalating over the next days.
When it comes to our preparedness, we are actually working in areas where we think the deplation will be displaced, so near White Nile, Cordova, White Nile Qatarif and we are escalating, scaling up our presence there, hoping that we will not need it.
But all the signals show that displacement is just on the rise.
Maybe just on the human rights side, let me remind you that yesterday the Office of the Higher Commission for Human Rights called for, in fact, there was a report that was published.
They called for an impartial, thorough and effective investigation into the attack on this Amazon internally displaced person camp in April.
The report detailed widespread killings, rape and other form of sexual violence, torture, abductions committed during the three day offensive and High Commissioner Turk said they were responsible for serious, serious violations of international law.
Be held accountable through fair proceedings.
And you can have more on this report from our colleagues at HCHRI.
Still have a question from John?
And then, and yes, I haven't forgotten you had something else to ask maybe John.
Yes, it's a follow up to what Mr Muhammad just mentioned.
I think I heard you correctly.
You said only about 11 to 13% of the shelter cluster in the UN has is funded for all the areas where you have the lead.
I was wondering if you see divergences, for instance, the shelter that you're providing for Palestinians in Gaza, are you managing to get the supplies in and how many supplies have you gotten in?
And other areas where you're having problems getting your supplies in either because of customs problems or political problems.
Is this force because my, my percentage is for Sudan, This is the shelter of Sudan and not the shelter for globally, not the global shelter cluster.
So if it's about Sudan challenges with the shelter, I think it would be definitely number 1 is a funding and 2nd definitely we have access and access here.
I can divide it into logistical access where as you can look at the Sudan map, it's huge.
The road conditions are very bad.
So bringing shelter items whether to deliver it cross-border or cross line is a quite logistic challenge and definitely the procratic embediments that we all see.
And just to give you one example we have when Al Fisher started like on the 25th, we anticipated that there will be extra need for shelter items.
On the on the 20th of October, we sent our trucks with with stands with non food items and it took them 3, three weeks plus to arrive in Towilo.
And this is still in one movement within Sudan itself.
There were stoppage at checkpoints, there were delays at checkpoints and OCHA Tom Fletcher has to intervene to release the blockages.
So this is the kind of challenge that we have and we have to work around the clock to make it happen.
So I cannot comment on that unfortunately.
But maybe my colleague in the patient can can answer on this yes and on the problem boxes in other.
With regard to to Gaza, as you are aware, it's currently actually experiencing winter storms and heavy rainfall.
And so IUMN partners are responding.
But without urgent and restricted access, life saving shelter assistance cannot reach people at scale.
So we continue to advocate for unrestricted access to make sure that these needs are are met.
And I can also mention that IEM and partners are delivering tents and also shelter materials to displaced families in in Gaza.
But again, with with heavy rains, as we've been seeing over the last few days and weeks, high quality emergency shelter is more urgent than ever right now.
Let me see if John, you have another follow up.
Yes, thank you for that information.
I just need a clarification of the supplies that earmarked by EMA, by IM and its partners.
Are you getting the supplies in or are you having problems of clearance of the goods going into Gaza?
What percentage of the goods that you're requesting to go in are getting in, especially on the shelter?
What percentage of the needs that you're?
I don't have the exact number at hand at the moment, but I'm happy to circle back and get back to you on this one bilaterally.
But again, overall, as I said, we do have access issues and we continue to advocate for unrestricted access.
I don't see other hands up.
And yes, I don't know to whom you wanted to ask you other questions or you found the solution.
It's no, I need to ask the question.
OK, So it would be to WHO?
No, we still have, we still have another speaker from FAO to whom I'm going now.
But I wanted to 1st thank Mohammed for coming back and updating us on the dire situation in Sudan.
Thank you very much come back anytime.
Good luck with your important, very important work in this dire situation.
Thanks for coming around and for answering the other questions And let me go now.
We're we're remaining on the African territory continent to to talk about another crisis in Eastern Africa.
We have with us a key, I think she's online and Cyril Fahon, who is the FAU resilience team leader for Eastern Africa, who's joining from Nairobi.
So you, you wanted to tell us about the poor rainfall season in the North or North Africa.
Thanks a lot and good good morning, everyone.
Let me start maybe with the the three top messages and I will unpack them a little bit.
So the first message indeed is that the owner of Africa is facing a severe drought.
The region has received less than 60% of the normal rain for the for the end of the year.
But the first message, the second message is that we already see impact on food security.
And we also witness people leaving the worst drought hit areas in Somalia and crossing into Ethiopia.
The third message is that responding to a drought is about implementing the right set of actions at the right time of the drought cycle.
And at the moment, the right set of actions is related to protecting livelihood, assets, agriculture, and that's what basically we need to focus on for the moment.
So these are the top 3 messages, but I can I will unpack them a little bit now.
So on the rainfall situation, as I said, the October, November, the October, December 2025 rainy season as essentially failed across the eastern north of Africa.
And the worst affected areas, as I said on average 60% below of normal rains.
But the worst affected areas have received less than 30% for some areas, which means no effective rainfall.
And some areas are also witnessing basically drier season on record and record is basically starting in 1981 in many areas as well as the first season of that is failing is the second, sometimes the third season and communities have barely recovered from the past drought.
The last drought was 20/20/2023.
So that's on the rainfall situation.
The immediate impact is very clear.
Widespread crop failure in Somalia, very lowly expected in part of Kenya as well.
We see deteriorating livestock conditions, reduced milk production and we anticipate livestock deaths in the coming few months.
There are already 185,000 people that have left or that have moved away from the drought hit areas of Somalia and about 56,000 of them have crossed into Ethiopia and that Somalia has already declared drought emergency on November 10th.
And we know that Kenya is reviewing the situation this week in terms of projected consequences for early 2026.
As I said, we already starting from a caseload that is very high already we have 2.1 million people severely food insecure in Kenya, 4.4 million people severely food insecure in Somalia and these analysis preceded the current rainy season failure.
So obviously the number are going to increase.
An additional population is likely to reach emergency which is IPC phase four in the coming few months.
This will go also with a rise in malnutrition, spreading livestock diseases increase potentially gender based violence and resource based conflict.
What we what we need to do now, as I said, the right action at the right time of a drought cycle.
So what is clear is that a drought should not necessarily translate or become a large multifaceted humanitarian crisis.
We need to reduce the impact and basically we need to focus on on, on on livelihood intervention because the first impact on the drought is on food production and livelihood.
So we need to mitigate the impact as soon as possible.
We may we must maintain food production at household level and reduce losses of asset, especially livestock and this goes through animal feed, animal health intervention, water intervention.
We also must provide financial means for people to buy food until basically they can resume a normal production patterns.
Unfortunately, at the moment the funding, it's not specific to the owner of Africa, but the funding is, is very, very scarce.
The funding against the 2025 humanitarian appeal is, is significantly below normal figures.
As far as FAO is concerned, we have received across the Eastern Africa region about 2025% of the funding requirements.
And in response to the drought, we are doing, of course, we are using our reserve fund, the special fund for emergencies and residence activity, which is fairer.
We have already basically allocated $4,000,000 to the countries for them to implement anticipatory action.
We are applying course correctors and crisis modifiers.
But definitely as the drought is unfolding, this is not going to be sufficient.
So as I said, in summary, we need to work now before the situation further deteriorate and turns into a multifaceted humanitarian crisis.
Thank you very much still and let me see if there are questions for you in the room.
I don't see any hand up or on.
Yes Jeremy, Launch Radio Front Centre National online.
Effective, more effective more in the the the the anticipatory action.
On that's your own effective more complete productive effective more on Arriva don't need effective more the the the manifestation, the security the manifestation of the population population of the +2 lay risk population.
Don't don't say de Vito maximum don't they push the vulnerability, push the fragility, push the effective, multi, multifaceted, necessary.
So it's not only to to Tariq.
This morning there was a post on social media by Doctor Tedros about the number of people evacuated Med Medevic from from Gaza.
It mentioned 10,000 evacuations since, since 7 October.
And I was wondering if you could specify how many of them were since the the last ceasefire and if the the rhythm of evacuation has accelerated recently or not.
And then the I will ask the other question which is to, to OCHA to Yen's and UNHCR on the refugees concerning Venezuela.
I would like to to ask you those organisations, if you are given the situation and the tensions in the region, if you are preparing any contingency plan, what are you expecting?
Are you preparing food or anything?
And yes, if you expect on the refugees side, any displacement through the borders.
And yes, so I'll give the floor to Tariq so that he can answer you, maybe ask Yance and Eugene to come to the podium in the meantime.
Yeah, thank you very much.
So yes, you've seen the post by Director General, I have to really check on exact numbers how many of these locations happened since the since the ceasefire.
But yes, there is there was an increase in in, in medical locations.
However, more than 18,000 500 patients including some 40% of that, sorry, including 4100 children still need medical education.
And we are calling for for countries to accept patients from Gaza, but we also all for medical adaptations to the best bank, including E Jerusalem to be restored.
As you know, many people were about 100 per day before the war were looking for medical care outside and and these roads to to to West Bank and to Jerusalem are are really vital.
So we asked for for those roads to be restored.
You've seen that according to the Ministry of Health, more than 1000 patients died while awaiting medical evocations between July 2024 and November 2025.
And this is likely under reported and not fully representative as it's just based on reported deaths.
So, so people are still in Gaza who need to be allocated and who need to get medical care.
We are supporting restoration of health services in Gaza, but it is taking time and many of these people don't have that time to wait.
And that's why we, we still, we are working on, on trying to, to get people out to get medical care in.
That's what I just wanted.
And now let me go to my colleagues here on Venezuela.
Is there anything you can share?
Without reference to any developments that we are currently seeing.
OSHA is constantly monitoring geopolitical situation, economic situation and so on and so forth anywhere in the world, including Latin America and preparing accordingly.
Having said that, you will also have seen in the global humanitarian overview for for next year that across the board, our programmes have, you know, for the humanitarian community writ large that taken a hit and that has hit Latin America also generally with several country countries which previously had response plans will not have that next year.
That can of course change with as I said, developing situations that that require us to to get back into the game again.
I can only echo what Yan said as a refugee agency that any displacement situation happening in the region, that we have a step and supply ready in the region and then we will be ready to support the government hosting those displacement population and also be ready to work closely with the hosting country.
I was wondering Tarek, can you elaborate a little bit more?
You said more than 1000 people waiting to be medically evacuated have died in the last year or so.
Do we know the principal illnesses they were suffering for?
Was it predominantly people suffering from cancer or was it also people with kidney failure couldn't have access to dialysis machines etcetera?
Can you give us the the key causes of death or is it just people with trauma that needed to be get to get out and didn't get out in time?
Tarek No, unfortunately, John, I don't have that.
And I can I can try to see with colleagues if, if we can, we can see that is the figure that came from the Ministry of Health.
And as you know, people who are waiting for vacation are, are are both people who have sustained trauma injuries due to explosions or bullets and also those with the with the chronic diseases.
So I don't have really that that that for example.
Thank you very much, Mohammed.
My question is also for Tariq, as previous speaker also mentioned that the cold weather is effective in Gaza and people also are dying because of that situation.
My question is, do is the evidence that for that how many people died because of cold weather in this year?
Mohammed, I'm sorry that I cannot give you exact number how many people died because of a cold weather.
There are many, many factors that can can lead to to disease and eventually to deaths.
Obviously when people are living in a in a poor hygiene, sanitary conditions, there is increased risk of, of, of respiratory diseases, of water borne diseases, of skin diseases.
We have been talking about this throughout the war in, in, in Gaza.
So what is really needed is to improve the the conditions.
So people have access to, to clean water, people have access to, to, to sanitation, to toilets and people do not really live in a, in a, in a cold conditions.
So, so all that is making that that people are right now with this, with, with floods, with the, with, with the, with the cold weather and with rain are more exposed and more at risk of getting disease.
And if you really put that on top of that, that there, there there is a still issue of availability of proper nutrition in Gaza, it means that people are vulnerable and especially children and, and, and those with the with the, with pre-existing medical condition.
Emma, yes, just to follow up on that question on Gaza, so hypothermia, people are dying of hypothermia right now.
Can you just confirm if that is definitely happening?
And on the UNHCR comments on cholera in Burundi and Congo, can you say anything about the scale of that and how concerning it is?
Bear with you, Terry, I will really have to get back to you again.
Like you know, Doctor Peppercorn was, was really clear when he was talking here last time that that, that you know, thousands of families are sheltering in a, in a, in a, in a, in a, in a, these shelters with the, with the debris and with the low at the low, low level coastal areas.
There is no drainage, there is no protective barriers.
So what he said and I repeat that at least 10 people have reportedly died last week due to heavy rains, underscoring really the life threatening conditions that families are facing.
So I don't have anything further than what Doctor Peoplecon said to you last Friday, but I may check if we have we have any any new numbers and all colour in Burundi in sorry in DRC maybe Eugene you want to say something.
There was indeed a cholera break at the beginning of the this year when the when the armed group move into Goma.
And the problem is that the old health facility in IDP sites was destroyed during this first violence.
And there is the region that we heard that there is a cholera outbreak, but we cannot access to this this region that particularly because of access issue and the blockage etcetera.
So we're still we're continuing to call all party to to the conflict that unimpeded access of humanitarian to those region to to continue to support those people in need is absolutely priority for us.
I see Ricardo's put this end up.
Ricardo, you have more maybe on on Gaza for children.
Hi Alessandra, good morning everyone.
Yes, very quickly on children who've been suffering with the horrendous weather and cold and and displacement and the floods in Gaza.
We have seen reports that in December up to now three children have died of hypothermia including yesterday a 2929 month old child.
So a baby who couldn't endure the disease that and, and and the cold temperatures and and the lack of medical infrastructure and medicines and support to help her survive so that the baby died 29 month old of hypothermia.
That's the third reported child who dies in December in Gaza.
This, this is a question for Tarek actually.
Do you have any information about the cholera outbreak in Gaza or other disease in Gaza?
And the second question about the medical evacuation, I know the priority is to treat this patient, but when, when you have like a permission for the medical evacuation, do you have also any guarantee that those people could return their home after the war?
And because since that Israelis facilitating the transfer of patient to other countries, but it doesn't allow them to go hospital to hospital in the West Bank or Jerusalem, for example?
So we, I don't have any information about any potential cholera cases we have put in place as doctor people can explain the early warning alert and response system and this was put in in January 2024, which is basically surveillance system to look, look for diseases.
Obviously if people don't have access to, to, to clean water, there is a risk of, of water borne diseases.
And now that people are in this in, in a poor water sanitation conditions, there is a risk of diarrheal diseases as well as the hepatitis and as I said, respiratory diseases.
So when it comes to to, to, to, to medical evacuation, basically the process is that every patient is looked by, by, by, by by health professionals and, and it's being looked if the care can be provided or not.
And then we look at who, which countries are willing to accept the patient and that's the process.
Now it really comes up to, to, to, to, to, to, to you should actually countries who are accepting patients, what is their policy of, of keeping them for how long and, and what are the, what are the, the possibilities for to, to, to, to, to come back?
Our really job is to help, to help advocate for, for patients to, to, to get that treatment.
And again, as I said, we really need to restore those referral pathways that we had before to East Jerusalem, to, to, to West Bank, but also also to, to, to Egypt and try really to, to save as many lives as possible.
But again, I can, I can speak about the medical side of it, but not on the on the right of return and, and, and, and how that that is being that is being done.
Thank you very much, Tarek.
I don't see other hands up.
So thank you to the colleagues for this additional information.
I don't have announcements, the final announcements for you, but a little bit of a logistics in from logistical information.
First of all, I like to point out that we have just issued a special edition of the Owner for Genet that, as you know, is our podcast in French that we published thanks to our colleagues and our interns at the end of each week.
And we have a recap of for 2025, which I found extremely interesting.
So I wanted to point you to listen to it.
I hope you listen to it all the time, but this one is particularly interesting.
As you know, this is the last briefing of the year, unless something happens that we are always ready to bring you back here if needed, but otherwise, the next briefing will be on the 6th of January 2026, first week, first briefing of the New year.
You have been receiving from Solange the list of the focal points who are on duty during this.
And I take the opportunity to thank Solange for the support that she's given to the briefings all this year.
And I know you have all counted on her, both spokesperson and journalist to help us with this.
So thank you very much Solange and Ali of course, because he also helped just to remind you that the Palais remains open.
The the usual conditions that is that we can, you can come in when you need.
But if you come on weekends or on holidays, which will be basically the 25th of December and the 1st of January, you have to go through me or Rolando or me Kelly or the person who are in on duty.
Other things that are closed, there are quite a few of them.
The bookshop closes today, will reopen on the 5th of January.
You're always asking about the accesses.
The Chimen de Faire closes today at 2O clock and will reopen on also on the at the end of the first week of of January.
The cafeteria is going to be closed from the 24th to the 5th back on.
Cordia will sustain us, will continue to sustain us except 2620 fifth, 26th and 1st of 2nd of January.
I think I've told you more or less everything on the on the logistics.
This office also closed on the 21st, closes on the 24th and reopen on the 3rd of January, well, on the 5th.
So that is what I had for you.
If there are no questions, I don't see hands up, let me see you on the platform now.
So I'm left to thank you all very, very much for your coverage, for your support, for your cooperation during this year, both journalist and colleague spokesperson.
It hasn't always been an easy year, but as the Director General said, it's been interesting.
We've done incredibly important things during this year.
I'm sure that would be the case also next year.
So I wish you all and your dear ones, a very happy holiday and a serene New year.
And I'll see you on the 6th of January.
Yeah, for another interesting and challenging, but definitely hope, let's hope.
