New york: Amina Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, warned that the worsening relationship between hunger and conflict poses a strategic and existential threat to international security. Speaking during an open Security Council debate on conflict-related food insecurity, she said that "war and hunger are often two faces of the same crisis".
According to Bahrain News Agency, Mohammed indicated that armed conflict drives acute food insecurity in 14 of 16 hunger hotspots worldwide, noting that 295 million people faced acute hunger last year, an increase of 14 million more than the year before. She pointed out that the world's total military expenditure over the past decade was estimated at $21.9 trillion, while ending hunger by 2030 would cost much less-$93 billion per year.
Mohammed warned that climate change is accelerating this crisis with deadly force, as floods wash away harvests, droughts turn fields to dust, and rising temperatures devastate grazing lands. She called on the international community to take immediate action through four pillars: ensuring the flow of aid, sustaining the ceasefire and upholding international humanitarian law, strengthening food systems as a pathway from fragility to resilience, recognising climate action as a fundamental pillar of food security and peace, and emphasising that only political solutions can end war and that achieving peace requires treating food and agriculture as strategic necessities.