Relief reaches volcano victims

Many people have not eaten for a week

Thousands of hungry residents have been gathering at distribution points across the devastated Congolese town of Goma to receive the first supplies of emergency food aid since last week's volcanic eruption.

Relief agencies handed out 22.5 tons of food on Wednesday - enough to feed 70,000 people for a week.

I'm so happy we have got food - I've got 15 children and they haven't eaten anything since Thursday

Angelina Mabinte

Efforts also got under way to reopen key roads in Goma, which were split in two by molten lava when Mount Nyiragongo blew up last Thursday.

However, powerful earth tremors and heavy rain have aggravated the relief work and compounded the misery of thousands of people who have been left homeless.

Click here to see the location of the volcano

The United Nations World Food Programme began rationing food at 10 distribution points and plans to open more centres later in the week.

At a sports stadium in the west of the city, several thousand people queued to receive parcels of maize, beans and cooking oil.

	Lava pours from three fissures down the flanks of the volcano and engulfs 14 villages Lava then reaches Goma, causing widespread devastation Detailed map of the eruption and aftermath

"I'm so happy we have got food. I've got 15 children and they haven't eaten anything since Thursday," said 32-year-old Angelina Mabinte.

The relief effort had been delayed amid fears of further eruptions.

There are signs that life is beginning to function again in what had been one of the country's only commercial centres before the eruption.

Traffic policeman in bright yellow uniforms directed a line of vehicles trying to make their way into the town along a relief road which had been carved through a path of solidified lava.

Economy destroyed

More than 90% of Goma's business district and 30% of its residential areas were destroyed when a deluge of molten rock and ash descended on the town, creating long-term hardship for its inhabitants.

Goma's business district was devastated

Some small shops have reopened in Goma's Banga district but few people can afford the exorbitant prices, Banga chief Hilaire Muhima Bungwa told the Associated Press news agency.

People continued to scrounge through the debris on Wednesday, looking for goods to salvage, while two boys tried to sell a bathtub they had retrieved from the lava.

In one positive development, relief workers declared the town's water supplies safe after fears they might have been contaminated by ash.

The UN's food agency has also begun distributing food in the town of Sake, about 30 kilometres (19 miles) west of Goma, and in Bukavu, where many families sought refuge.

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