El Tayeb Siddig/Reuters/File
A boy sits on a hill overlooking a refugee camp near the Chad-Sudan border on November 9, 2023. Hundreds of Masalit families from Sudan's West Darfur state moved here months after fleeing to the Chadian border town of Adre following a massacre that targeted ethnic groups. In the town of El Geneina.
CNN
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The war in Sudan is “creating the world's largest hunger crisis”, with more than 25 million people “in a spiral” of food insecurity, a United Nations agency has warned.
The United Nations' World Food Program (WFP) said Wednesday that nine out of 10 people across the country face “emergency levels of hunger” and are “stranded” in areas that are “almost inaccessible” due to “relentless violence and interference by parties to the conflict.” announced that it was doing so.
The war has caused the world's largest displacement crisis, with 18 million people in Sudan in “severe food insecurity” and millions more in neighboring South Sudan and Chad, according to the United Nations. food insecurity.
“Twenty years ago, the world rallied to respond to the world’s biggest hunger crisis in Darfur. But today, the people of Sudan are forgotten. Millions of lives and peace and stability across the region are at stake. They are at risk,” said WFP Executive Director Cindy McCain.
Thousands of people have been killed and eight million displaced since fighting broke out in April between forces loyal to two rival generals, army commander Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the militia Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
Both armies and their allied militias have been accused of killing civilians, looting homes and ethnic cleansing, leading to accusations of crimes against humanity and fueling an exodus from the East African country.
WFP said it was currently “struggling to respond to significant levels of need” and said the humanitarian response in two neighboring states was “reaching breaking point”.
The crisis has worsened since a plan to transport aid from Chad to Sudan's Darfur region was forced to halt after local authorities revoked permits for cross-border truck convoys, according to WFP. ing. Since August, more than one million people have received WFP assistance through this route.
One in five children in transit centers at major border crossings between Sudan and South Sudan are malnourished, according to WFP.
“Newly arrived refugees in South Sudan make up less than 3 percent of the population, yet account for 35 percent of those facing catastrophic levels of hunger, the highest possible level. ” added WFP.
Ebrahim Hamid/AFP/AFP via Getty Images
A woman sorts grain at a market in Gedaref, eastern Sudan, on February 22, 2024. Almost a year after the war that brought Sudan to the brink of collapse, the United Nations' World Food Program says the majority of Sudan's people are starving. Say.
The warning from WFP comes after U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said the United Nations had found evidence that 14-year-old girls had been raped by “elements” of Rapid Relief Forces at a WFP storage facility controlled by paramilitary factions. The announcement came after the company said it had discovered the virus. .
Thomas-Greenfield read out portions of the UN Panel of Experts' final report on Sudan on Wednesday, describing it as “52 pages of stomach-churning research”.
The report claimed that RSF snipers “indiscriminately targeted civilians, including women, pregnant women, and young people,” and that “schools, hospitals, markets, government buildings, and humanitarian assets were mainly targeted by RSF It was plundered by the Germans and their allied militias, and destroyed by shelling and bombing.” by two warring parties. ”
The United Nations has previously said the surge in gender-based violence since the outbreak of fighting amounted to crimes against humanity. In July, the United Nations announced that 4.2 million women and girls are at risk of sexual violence, and a CNN investigation details widespread incidents of sexual assault by Sudanese activists, particularly in the Darfur region. It has been reported that the entire community has been affected. ravaged by targeted ethnic-based killings.
AFP/Getty Images
Sudanese civilians walk along an empty road with many shops closed for safety reasons in the city of Gedaref in eastern Sudan on January 10, 2024.
Thomas-Greenfield said the latest report included “ghastly photographs” taken in West Darfur “where the RSF targeted people from the Masalit community”.
“This is just some of the death, destruction and depravity that has characterized this conflict. As this report details, this conflict is fueled by arms transfers from a small number of regional powers. “The transfer of force must stop,” she said, adding that the international community was “not doing enough” to address the crisis.
“I hope this sobering report will finally shake the world from its indifference to the horrors unfolding before our eyes,” she added.
