With a population with a majority of Diola and Christian, the effects of a large migration of Wolof Muslims fleeing drought in the north during the 1970s caused tensions to flare.

More than 100,000 refugees fleeing drought and war have crossed into Pakistan in the past five months.

In 1889, most of the settlers who flocked here were immigrants, former Civil War soldiers, blacks and farmers fleeing drought.

Dadaab's Ifo II camp will provide additional shelter for the ever-increasing number of refugees fleeing drought and conflict in Somalia.

Increasing numbers of Ethiopians and Somalis fleeing war, drought and poverty in their home countries face arrest, deportation and detention as they try to make their way to the south of the continent.

But in the last three years, waves of peasants fleeing drought and rural violence have swollen Puno's population, now 120,000, by about a third, according to Juan Sotomayor Perez, who was re-elected Mayor here.

Thousands have also fled drought and fighting in southern Somalia into the equally water-starved border areas of Ethiopia.

More than two million Afghan refugees who have fled civil war and drought in the last two decades are in Iran.

According to one local tradition, the Sabahs migrated south to flee drought in Najd in 1710, but found conditions bleaker.

The United Nations official conducting a worldwide survey of displaced people said that families fleeing drought in Afghanistan now constitute "the fastest growing displacement crisis anywhere."