Climate change

A new Amnesty International report has delivered a damning indictment of both Somali authorities and the international community for failing to protect thousands displaced by one of the Horn of Africa’s worst droughts in decades.
The report, “No Rain, No Food, No Animals: The Human Rights Impact of Drought and Displacement in Somalia,” exposes how neglect, conflict, and global climate inaction have left entire communities destitute.
Between 2020 and 2023, climate change-driven droughts devastated southern Somalia, forcing families to abandon barren farmlands and travel hundreds of kilometres to crowded camps or across the border into Kenya’s Dadaab refugee complex.
Many, Amnesty says, died along the way from hunger and disease.
“Somalia is on the frontline of human-induced climate change,” said Tigere Chagutah, Amnesty’s Regional Director for East and Southern Africa.
“Its people are paying for a crisis caused largely by industrialised nations that continue to burn fossil fuels without remorse.”
While Somalia contributes almost nothing to global carbon emissions, it ranks among the seven most climate-vulnerable nations in the world.
Food prices have soared by 160% since 2020, and water scarcity has triggered outbreaks of cholera and mass migration.
Yet, Amnesty notes, Somalia allocates less than 5% of its national budget to health, despite pledging 15% under the African Union’s Abuja Declaration.
Personal accounts in the report lay bare the human toll. “When the drought came, everything dried up,” said Bile, a farmer from Jilib who lost his parents to famine after fleeing with his wife and eight children.
Amnesty has called on Somalia to adopt urgent resilience and climate adaptation policies — but also urged wealthy nations to honour climate finance pledges made under the Paris Agreement.
“The injustice is staggering,” said Chagutah. “Those who did the least to cause this crisis are suffering the most — abandoned by both their government and the world.”
– CAJ News