Kenya: UN official deplores deadly slum violence, calls for calm

Voicing deep concern at the continuing escalation of violence and rising death toll in the Mathare slums in Nairobi, Kenya, a senior United Nations official today called for calm and urged all involved to work together to find a peaceful and lasting solution.

The Director-General of the UN Office at Nairobi Anna Tibaijuka issued a statement deploring the news that almost a dozen lives had been lost and thousands of people, including women and children, as well as HIV/AIDS sufferers, had been forced to flee their homes as a result of these clashes.

Mrs. Tibaijuka, who is also Executive Director of UN-HABITAT, the agency that seeks to achieve sustainable development of human settlements, asked all concerned to address the underlying causes of the violence which has affected the lives of thousands of Nairobi’s most vulnerable and under-privileged citizens.

She reaffirmed UN-HABITAT’s commitment to work with the Kenyan Government and others to provide safe drinking water and adequate sanitation and improve the lives of inhabitants of informal settlements such as Mathare through programmes such as Water for African Cities, the Kenya Slum Upgrading Programme and the Safer Cities Nairobi initiative.