The United Nations has allocated $20 million for an urgent food security and nutrition campaign for hunger-hit northeast Nigeria, a UN spokesman said on Tuesday.

With $9 million from the Central Emergency Response Fund and $11 million from the Nigeria Humanitarian Fund, "we will support the government-led response efforts across Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states," said Farhan Haq, the deputy spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

Haq said the assistance includes food, ready-to-eat meals, access to clean water, health care and agriculture support.

Almost 700,000 children under five are likely to suffer from life-threatening severe acute malnutrition this year in this region and more than 500,000 people may face emergency levels of food insecurity during the lean season from June to August, he said, citing reports from humanitarian partners.

"The emergency funding will help jumpstart the response, but humanitarian partners need more to prevent widespread hunger and malnutrition," he said.

The spokesman also said the 1.3 billion dollar humanitarian response plan for Nigeria this year is only 26 percent funded.

Meanwhile, the Libyan Illegal Immigration Control Department on Tuesday deported 165 female illegal immigrants back to Nigeria.

"Some of them were arrested as they were begging on the streets and others were arrested during raids on criminal hideouts," said the department's spokesman Haitham Belgasem, adding that more deportation flights would be arranged in the future.

Due to the insecurity and chaos in the country since the fall of late leader Muammar Gaddafi's regime in 2011, many immigrants, mostly Africans, choose to cross the Mediterranean Sea to European shores via Libya.

(With input from Xinhua)