Flooded Togo's urgent aid appeal

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Togo has issued an urgent international appeal for food and medicine to help deal with flooding that has affected almost half the countries in Africa.

Governments and aid agencies in the other affected nations are warning that hundreds of thousands of people are still awaiting vital relief supplies.

Twenty-three people are confirmed dead in Togo, with 20,000 others homeless.

It is estimated the recent floods, which are now subsiding, have killed at least 300 people across Africa so far.

The government of Togo - one of the world's poorest countries - has so far put around $1.1m (£535,000) into rescue and repair operations.

West and Central Africa have taken the brunt of the flooding over the past month.

The European Union has offered two million euros (£1.4m) to help Togo, Ghana and Burkina Faso, three of the worst hit among 20 countries affected.

Uganda - itself badly hit - says transport routes to Sudan, where more than 600,000 people are said be in urgent need of aid, have been badly disrupted.

The United Nations has warned the floods could lead to locust infestations and outbreaks of water-borne diseases such as cholera and dysentery.