Turkey to step up aid, PM says after Somali visit

Erdoğan is the first world leader outside Africa to visit Somalia in the last 20 years, according to the Anatolia news agency.

Turkey will continue to send aid to Somalia to help prevent child deaths from hunger, Erdoğan said on Saturday after meeting with NGOs to discuss the situation in Somalia after returning from a visit there to ensure the coordination of assistance.

“Through this visit, we have demonstrated to the world the support of our government and relief organizations,” Erdoğan said in a statement following the meeting. “We want the attention and interest of the world to be on the human drama in Somalia,” he said.

“We aim to take steps in the field of education so that the people may come to the point of self-sufficiency,” he added.

Erdoğan stressed that Turkey took action to provide aid in the fastest way possible at a time when many countries were hesitant to reach out to Somalia.

A field hospital established by the Turkish Ministry of Health treats an average of 500 people each day.

A medical staff of 21 people, including a pediatrician, infectious disease specialist, internal medicine specialist, obstetrician, a general surgeon, general practitioners, nurses and technicians, are providing services in the fully equipped hospital.

One of the doctors working in Mogadishu under the Ministry of Health National Medical Rescue Team (UMKE) said that the field hospital, consisting of doctors who have worked in other recent humanitarian disasters such as Pakistan and Haiti, are equipped to provide all examinations and treatments except for major surgery.

During his Somalia visit Erdoğan visited the field hospital and announced that Turkey will establish a fully fledged hospital in the area in the future.

Somali Minister of Education Dr. Ahmed Aidid Ibrahim and Kimse Yok Mu Mogadishu Representative Bilal Çelik, signed an agreement on Saturday to provide Somalia with all levels education in the future.

Çelik said in his address at the signing ceremony that all relevant aspects of education have been included in the agreement, including primary, secondary and university education as well as university language and teacher preparation courses.   

Somali citizens created a Facebook group to express their appreciation for Erdoğan and the citizens of Turkey for “showing support and coming to the rescue when we needed help and support most,” Somali citizen Said Isak told Today's Zaman.

The “Thank you PM Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Turkey for supporting Somalia” group plans to send thank you cards and flowers to Turkish embassies and missions around the globe on Monday to relay its heartfelt gratitude and admiration. As of Sunday afternoon, the group had 1,789 members on Facebook.

Reporting on her recent visit to Kenya, Zaman columnist Leyla İpekçi wrote Sunday that she and other journalists had made the journey to Africa because they were haunted by the images of starving children.

The group visited some refugee camps and İpekçi described the preparations everyone was making for Erdoğan's visit.

A woman pouring water on the ground caught the journalist's attention. İpekçi learned that this was a task assigned to the woman, and she figured that it was to keep the sand from flying up in the wind when Erdoğan and his delegation arrived.

It was not until she made eye contact with the woman that she realized how difficult this task was for her. “She was pouring the greatest blessing onto the sand when she could not find enough water to bathe or even drink,” İpekçi wrote. “I realized at that moment how far we were from understanding suffering.”