ISTANBUL (AFP) - Turkey's prime minister will head to Somalia next week to meet with people affected by a drought and famine that has already claimed thousands of lives, the Anatolia news agency said Thursday.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan will leave Turkey on August 18 after an extraordinary meeting in Istanbul of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation on the situation in Somalia, the news agency reported.
Turkey had earlier this week pushed for the special OIC meeting on Somalia, and has issued a call to the body's 57 member states to help those affected by Africa's worst food crisis in decades.
Erdogan, who will travel to Somalia with his wife Emine and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, returning on August 19, had previously signalled his intention to visit the country.
"I am convinced that our people are keeping in their minds the suffering" of the Somali people, Erdogan said Wednesday at a meeting of officials from his political party, according to Anatolia.
He said Turkey could not "remain spectators of this spectacle of human misery," explaining he wanted to visit the affected areas himself to assess the situation.
Somalia is the country hardest hit by a drought that has affected people around the Horn of Africa region.
UN officials have said some 12 million people are in danger of starvation.
© 2011 AFP
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