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MSF halts all operations in Somalia over security fears

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French Medical aid group Doctors Without Borders (MSF) closed down all operations in Somalia Wednesday over attacks on its staff, accusing the Somalian leadership and armed groups of condoning "the killing, assaulting and abducting" of aid workers.

Medical aid agency Doctors Without Borders (MSF) closed all its operations in war-torn Somalia on Wednesday, warning of growing insecurity, after 22 years of working in the Horn of Africa troublespot.

"The closure of our activities is a direct result of extreme attacks on our staff, in an environment where armed groups and civilian leaders increasingly support, tolerate, or condone the killing, assaulting, and abducting of humanitarian aid workers," MSF president Unni Karunakara told reporters.

The pullout by MSF, an aid agency that has earned a reputation for working in the toughest of conditions, is major blow to the reputation of the internationally-backed government in Mogadishu and will affect hundreds of thousands of people.

"We are ending our programmes in Somalia because there is an increasing imbalance between the risks and compromises that our staff must make, and our ability to provide impartial care to the Somali people," Karunakara said in the Kenyan capital.

MSF has treated more than 300,000 people so far this year alone in Somalia, a statement added.

Karunakara, who said MSF's activities had been put under "unparallelled levels of risk", cited the killing of two staff in Mogadishu in December 2011 -- and subsequent release of the gunman -- as well as the kidnapping of two MSF workers from the Kenyan refugee camp Dadaab in October 2011.

The two kidnapped staff, Spanish women working as logisticians, were released last month after 21 months in captivity in Somalia.

But MSF said that wider attacks had forced it to make the "painful" decision to shut operations.

"Respect for humanitarian principles, always fragile in conflict zones, no longer exists in Somalia today," Karunakara added.

The closure of MSF medical operations in at least 11 sites -- including in the capital Mogadishu, where MSF runs the only intensive care unit for children -- will impact hundreds of thousands of the most needy Somalis, he said.

Many of those areas are not under the control of central government, including in Burao in the self-declared independent region of Somaliland, Galkayo in the northeastern Puntland region and the flashpoint southern port of Kismayo.

Operations were also shut in areas under the control of the extremist Shebab, who had allowed MSF to work despite expelling almost all other international aid agencies.

"Already receiving far less assistance than is needed, the armed groups' targeting of humanitarian aid, and civilians leaders' tolerance of these abuses, has effectively taken away what little access to medical care is available to the Somali people," Karunakara said.

Last year, MSF's more than 1,500 staff provided over 624,000 medical consultations and admitted more than 41,000 patients to hospitals.

Somalia's embattled government, selected in November in a UN-backed process, was hailed at the time by the international community as offering the best chance for peace in Somalia since the collapse of central government in 1991.

A 17,700-strong African Union force fighting alongside the national army has forced Shebab fighters from a string of towns in the past two years.

But Somalia's often rag-tag security forces, incorporating multiple militia forces into its ranks, has also been repeatedly accused by rights groups of a string of abuses.

(AFP)