The
war between Sudan's army and the paramilitary Rapid Support
Forces (RSF) has sparked widespread hunger in the country, after
destroying infrastructure and markets and displacing more than eight
million people.
The InterAgency Working Group (IAWG),
a consortium of both local and international humanitarian organisations
is alerting the international community to the urgency of the needs, as
France is to host an international summit this Monday in Paris.
Sudan's
vast western region of Darfur was still reeling from the carnage of a
2003 conflict when this new war broke out in April 2023.
Fighting started on 15 April 2023 between Abdel Fattah al-Burhan's army and Mohammed Hamdan Daglo's (RSF).
Diplomats and aid workers rapidly left Sudan, effectively ceasing to serve those most vulnerable.
Looting,
fighting, air strikes and roads cut by warring factions have isolated
every region of the northeast African country more than three times the
size of France.
Million of refugees and displaced people
The conflict has uprooted eight million people in Sudan, displacing 6.7 million inside the country, and 1.8 million in neighbouring countries.
Some
3.4 million people are in urgent need of humanitarian help in Chad
only, following the arrival of large numbers of Sudanese refugees
fleeing war.
More than 400,000 Sudanese refugees had already fled to Chad between 2003 and 2020, according to the UN.
"Provinces
in the east of Chad are among the country's most vulnerable zones with
poor access to basic services, and the arrival of refugees drastically
exacerbates the need," French NGO Action Contre La Faim (ACF, or Action Against Hunger), said in a statement in April.
"It
is urgent for donors to guarantee sustainable financing of the
humanitarian response," said ACF's Chad director Henri-Noel Tatangang.
Only 4.5 percent of requirements are currently covered, he added.
Chad's
transitional president Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno declared a "state of
food and nutritional emergency" throughout the country in February.
Hundreds of thousands refugees are also fleeing the conflict in South Sudan and even Egypt.
The United Nations
had warned in March that life-saving food aid for hundreds of thousands
of people pouring out of war-torn Sudan would grind to a halt in April
without international funding.
It added it has been able to reach only 10 percent of Sudan's 48 million people, with the country on the brink of famine.
'Catastrophic hunger'
The World Food Programme (WFP) recently said it had negotiated the delivery of the first two convoys of food aid into Sudan's Darfur region in months.
One
convoy with 1,300 tonnes of supplies was able to arrive via the Adre
border crossing with Chad into West and Central Darfur, two areas
already seeing emergency levels of hunger after being overrun by the
Rapid Support Forces.
But the UN organisation is also raising warnings of impending famine caused by a one-year war and lack of access to food aid.
Catastrophic
hunger, the term used for famine conditions, is expected in Khartoum
and West Darfur, which have seen the fiercest attacks, according to the
Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS Net), as well as in many other areas of Darfur that house millions of displaced people.
More than 18 million people facing acute hunger need assistance, the WFP says.
"I
fear that we will see unprecedented levels of starvation and
malnutrition sweep across Sudan this lean season," said WFP Sudan
Country Director, Eddie Rowe, said in his latest statement, referring to
the upcoming planting months.
The previous cereal harvest is half
of previous levels according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation,
while prices of some goods have doubled.
Complicated access to aid
Aid is hardly reaching these populations, because of insecurity but also predation.
The belligerents are accused of using hunger as a weapon of war and diverting humanitarian aid.
This
worries donors around the world, risking an impact on the quantity of
aid obtained by humanitarians, according to Anette Hoffmann, an
international relations researcher in The Hague, Netherlands.
She
told RFI that she asks actors to adapt their methods. After decades of
Omar al Bashir rule, including manipulation and diversion of aid being
very prominent, NGOs have learned lessons.
"Channeling aid to local
responders minimises the risk of seeking aid weaponised by both parties,
which is definitely a practice that is ongoing," she said.
Using
multiple entry points through the various borders, by working, cutting
out middlemen, working with smaller portions or less concentration of
aid, are all mechanisms that can, maybe not eliminate but mitigate the
risk of aid diversion and starvation as a weapon of war."
"This is the positive note on the 30 years of al-Bashir's dictatorship, these learnings and this is the time to apply them."
New state at war
Meanwhile,
drones hit the Sudanese city of al-Gadaref the second week of April,
eyewitnesses and the local governor said, bringing the country's
devastating war to a calm farming state.
Almost half a million displaced people have taken refuge in around Gadaref, the capital of al-Gadaref State.
Eyewitnesses
said at least two drones had targeted military installations in
Gadaref, which is located just to the east of Gezira.
They said they heard explosions as well as anti-aircraft missiles being fired from the ground.
The RSF has taken control of the capital Khartoum,
neighbouring Gezira state as well as most of the Darfur and Kordofan
regions in the west, while the army holds the north and east of Sudan
including its main Red Sea port.
(with newswires)
