IOM Relief Operation Ramped Up as Clearer Picture Emerges on Displaced in Haiti
Up to 25,000 earthquake victims in Port au Prince are expected to
be provided with non-food relief assistance by IOM today in five
locations in the city as the Organization ramps up its response to
the earthquake in Haiti.
Until today, IOM had provided pre-positioned emergency relief
supplies to about 60,000 people. But with new supplies now coming
in on a daily basis, the Organization and humanitarian partners
working on helping survivors with shelter and non-food assistance
are scaling up their response.
IOM and partners are also focusing on solutions for those living
in spontaneous settlements whose homes were damaged or
destroyed.
There are more than 300 of these settlements scattered
throughout the city, with an estimated 370,000 people living under
improvised shelter and no access to water supplies, according to
assessments by IOM and its partners. Until tents can be
provided, priority needs for those in these settlements include
plastic sheeting, water containers, and water purification
tablets.
a Donation
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target="_blank" title="">Haiti Earthquake Flash Appeal
2010
"There are entire neighbourhoods that are empty," says IOM's
Chief of Mission Vincent Houver. "The poorest of the poor
have stayed in the city but many people have left Port au Prince,
mainly to other towns where they have relatives or
friends."
A second wave of people leaving the capital are those that have
no relatives or friends and are going to towns that do not have the
capacity to absorb these flows.
A large influx of displaced survivors are reported to have
arrived from the capital in Miragoane in Nippes department, with
another 5,000 people having arrived in Grand Anse department by
boat and road, including injured people, according to humanitarian
partners on the ground.
IOM sub-offices in Haiti report that local governments want to
establish settlements to house those displaced from Port au
Prince.
Elsewhere, a joint IOM, European Union, WFP and UNDAC assessment
in Jacmel on 18 January found an estimated 12,000 people displaced
from damage to their homes and camping out in up to eight different
settlements. Immediate needs identified included medical
assistance, shelter, water and sanitation and burying the bodies of
those killed.
IOM supplies of water-purifying tablets, jerry cans, hygiene and
kitchen kits as well as mosquito nets, plastic sheets, sleeping
mats and tarpaulins were distributed in Jacmel last weekend by
UNICEF.
Meanwhile, work has started at a site identified over the
weekend in the suburb of Croix des Bouquets for a large temporary
settlement. A Brazilian battalion deployed with MINUSTAH is
levelling the land for the establishment of a tented settlement
that would facilitate aid delivery to large numbers of displaced
and where the Inter-American Development Bank is planning to build
permanent houses for 30,000 people.
IOM and its partners estimate that 200,000 families or one
million persons are in need of immediate shelter support.
As part of an initial appeal launched last week, the
Organization is asking for US$30 million to provide emergency
shelter, non-food assistance, track internal displacement and among
other things, establish a food-for-work programme that would
include rubble removal.
IOM has so far received pledges totalling USD 16.3 million from
the US government (OFDA/USAID), Sweden's development agency
Sida, the UN's Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), Argos Cement
Company of Colombia, and the Clinton Foundation to support ongoing
relief operations and future rebuilding efforts.
Private donations can be made to IOM through the IOM website at
"http://www.iom.int">www.iom.int and in the United States at
class="paragraph-link-no-underline-bold" href=
"http://www.usaim.org/PROJECTHaiti.asp" target="_blank" title=
"">http://www.usaim.org/PROJECTHaiti.asp
For further information, please contact:
Niurka Pineiro
Port au Prince
Tel: + 509 3490 6678
E-mail:
"mailto:niurkapineiro@yahoo.com%20" target="_blank" title=
"">niurkapineiro@yahoo.com
or
Jean Philippe Chauzy
IOM Geneva
Tel: + 41 22 717 9361
+ 41 79 285 4366
E-mail:
"mailto:pchauzy@iom.int" target="_blank" title=
"">pchauzy@iom.int
Jemini Pandya
Tel: + 41 22 717 9486
+ 41 79 217 3374
E-mail:
"mailto:jpandya@iom.int" target="_blank" title=
"">jpandya@iom.int