One-month World Food Program (WFP) rations have been distributed to 6,000 people who took refuge near the Somali-Kenyan border after intense fighting forced them from their homes, U.N. spokeswoman Michelle Montas said Friday. WFP plans to distribute food across to the Kenyan side once the border is reopened, Montas told reporters. Asked by S.P.A. whether the United Nations was trying to secure an open border, she replied that the world body was concerned. Montas said that there are approximately 4,700 internally displaced Somalis stuck on the Somali-Kenyan border. Kenya closed the border on January 2 as fighting continued between the Ethiopian-backed Somali Transitional Federal Government (TFG) and the Union of Islamic Courts, who had taken over the eastern part of the country, including Mogadishu. One of the top five donors to WFP's Somali program for 2006 was Saudi Arabia. WFP still needs at least $40 million for its work in Somalia for 2007.
