Conditions for those affected by famine in Somalia have improved dramatically and unexpectedly in recent weeks, with the number of people now at imminent risk of starvation falling by two-thirds, according to the UN.

Concerns are mounting of a possible hidden famine in Eritrea while international aid agencies scramble to fill a "black hole" in information coming out of the isolated Horn of Africa nation.

The UK's military deployment in Afghanistan is not "the most important part of our contribution" and is only the "supporting element to wider governance and development operations" in the country, the head of Britain's military has stressed.

India has become the world's largest importer of arms, accounting for 9 per cent of all global purchases. As we report today, its annual defence budget stands at a record £22.3bn – an 11 per cent rise over the previous year – more than double the amount that India, with its rapidly rising economy, spends on education and health combined.

The Dadaab refugee camp in north Kenya is now the third most populous city in the country. It holds 360,000 people who have fled from neighbouring Somalia, where drought and civil war have combined to threaten famine. Oxfam says 10,000 a week are arriving at the camp, where they squat hopefully outside the perimeter in increasing squalor.

Afghanistan is so dependent on foreign aid that it could face an economic crisis when the West ends its military intervention in the country in 2014, a United States Senate report warned yesterday, criticising the way the US had sunk billions into unsustainable projects in the shattered country.

Several prosecutions are likely following investigations into leaks of letters written to the Prime Minister by Liam Fox, the Defence Secretary predicted yesterday.

Downing Street insisted today the Government was committed to enshrining its overseas aid spending targets in law, despite objections by Defence Secretary Liam Fox.