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The BBC's Africa correspondent Andrew Harding says the emotive word "famine" is used rarely and carefully by humanitarian organisations, and it is the first time since 1992 that the word has been applied to a situation in Somalia. Nearly half the Somali population - 3.7 million people - were in crisis, he said, with most of them in the south. Drought, conflict and poverty have now combined to produce the necessary conditions for famine. News International's parent company News Corporation has also confirmed it has stopped paying the legal fees of former private detective Glenn Mulcaire, who was convicted of phone hacking on behalf of the News of the World in 2007. Al-Shabab, an al-Qaeda-affiliated group which controls large swathes of south and central Somalia, had imposed a ban on foreign aid agencies in its territories in 2009, but has recently allowed limited access. Mr Cameron said the public inquiry would be widened to examine broadcasters and social media and named the panel Downing Street and Buckingham Palace denied claims by Labour MP Chris Bryant that royal officials raised concerns about Mr Coulson's appointment

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"If we don't act now, famine will spread to all eight regions of southern Somalia within two months, due to poor harvests and infectious disease outbreaks," said the UN humanitarian co-ordinator for Somalia, Mark Bowden. "What we need is assurances from the World Food Programme and from other agencies, the United Nations or other agencies, both public and in the non-governmental sector, who are willing to go into Somalia who will tell us affirmatively that they are not being taxed by al-Shabab, they are not being subjected to bribes from al-Shabab, Mr Cameron said the public inquiry would be widened to examine broadcasters and social media and named the panel During Wednesday's House of Commons debate on the phone-hacking scandal, MPs called on News International to publish the full exchanges about e-mails examined by the legal firm. In April 2010 US President Barack Obama issued an executive order naming al-Shabab a terrorist organisation, meaning no US aid could go to areas under its control, our analyst adds.

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She said the US had already provided $431m this year in emergency aid to the Horn of Africa, but that was "not enough". News International's parent company News Corporation has also confirmed it has stopped paying the legal fees of former private detective Glenn Mulcaire, who was convicted of phone hacking on behalf of the News of the World in 2007. During Wednesday's House of Commons debate on the phone-hacking scandal, MPs called on News International to publish the full exchanges about e-mails examined by the legal firm. An estimated 10 million people have been affected in East Africa by the worst drought in more than half a century. More than 166,000 desperate Somalis are estimated to have fled their country to neighbouring Kenya or Ethiopia. He said discussions with al-Shabab about the safe distribution of food aid were taking place at a local level, and that responses were expected to differ depending on the locality. The BBC's Africa correspondent Andrew Harding says the emotive word "famine" is used rarely and carefully by humanitarian organisations, and it is the first time since 1992 that the word has been applied to a situation in Somalia.

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The protester accused of throwing shaving foam at Rupert Murdoch is charged with a public order offence He said discussions with al-Shabab about the safe distribution of food aid were taking place at a local level, and that responses were expected to differ depending on the locality. Prime Minister David Cameron told MPs that "with hindsight" he would not have hired ex-News of the World editor Andy Coulson as his communications chief, in the closest he has come to an apology. In Somalia's war-ravaged capital, Mogadishu, the BBC's Mohamed Mwalimu says more than 4,000 people are crammed into one camp, called Safety. But US aid officials say assurances must be given that the insurgents will not interfere with its distribution. 'Dangerously inadequate' One woman he met arrived after a long trip, much of it on foot, carrying her one-and-a-half-year-old son on her back - only to realise, when she arrived, that he was dead.

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In April 2010 US President Barack Obama issued an executive order naming al-Shabab a terrorist organisation, meaning no US aid could go to areas under its control, our analyst adds. Those conditions include more than 30% of children being acutely malnourished, and four children out of every 10,000 dying daily. Families have built their own homes at the camp with tree branches, wood and plastic sheets, he says. The US considers al-Shabab a terrorist group and last year stopped aid to the large area of Somalia it controls. An estimated 10 million people have been affected in East Africa by the worst drought in more than half a century. More than 166,000 desperate Somalis are estimated to have fled their country to neighbouring Kenya or Ethiopia. The UK Secretary of State for International Development, Andrew Mitchell, said the response by many European and developed countries to the crisis in the Horn of Africa had been "derisory and dangerously inadequate".