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LAST UPDATE | 1 May 2023
THE FIGHTING RAGING in Sudan could spur more than 800,000 people to flee into neighbouring countries, the United Nations has warned.
The UN’s refugee agency UNHCR said that it was now working with a planning figure of hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the violence that erupted in Sudan on 15 April.
“UNHCR, with governments and partners, is preparing for the possibility that over 800,000 people may flee the fighting in Sudan for neighbouring countries,” the agency’s chief Filippo Grandi said in a tweet.
UNHCR, with governments and partners, is preparing for the possibility that over 800,000 people may flee the fighting in Sudan for neighbouring countries.
— Filippo Grandi (@FilippoGrandi) May 1, 2023
We hope it doesn’t come to that, but if violence doesn’t stop we will see more people forced to flee Sudan seeking safety.
“We hope it doesn’t come to that, but if violence doesn’t stop we will see more people forced to flee Sudan seeking safety.”
Grandi’s tweet, which was verified by his office, came as gun battles and explosions again rocked Sudan’s capital despite the latest truce formally agreed between the warring parties, and amid UN warnings that the humanitarian crisis had brought the country near its “breaking point”.
More than 500 people have been reported killed since fighting erupted between Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, who commands the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
The chaos and bloodshed, now in its third week, has sparked a mass exodus to neighbouring countries including Egypt, Chad and the Central African Republic.
The latest figures from UNHCR teams on the ground showed that at least 73,000 people have already arrived in those countries from Sudan, a spokesman said, adding that that figure included both Sudanese nationals and mainly South Sudanese refugees returning home.
Sudan hosted 1.13 million refugees before the conflict started – one of the largest refugee populations in Africa – including some 800,000 from South Sudan.
The fighting has also triggered a mass exodus of foreigners and international staff, with countries the world over launching frantic evacuations by land, sea and air.
Grandi’s estimate of how many people could ultimately flee the violence marked a dramatic increase from last Tuesday, when UNHCR gave a planning figure of possibly 270,000 people fleeing into neighbouring Chad and South Sudan.
Millions of Sudanese around the capital and beyond have sheltered in their homes with dwindling food and water and frequent power cuts, as fighter jets thundering through the sky on bombing raids have drawn heavy anti-aircraft fire.
“The scale and speed of what is unfolding is unprecedented in Sudan,” said Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN chief Antonio Guterres. “We are extremely concerned by the immediate as well as long-term impact on all people in Sudan, and the broader region.”
Top UN humanitarian official Martin Griffiths was heading to the region to help bring relief to the millions “whose lives have turned upside down overnight”.
“The humanitarian situation is reaching breaking point,” Dujarric said.
Fighting has spread across Sudan, including to the long-troubled Darfur region.
The UN said at least 96 people were reported killed in El Geneina, West Darfur, where supplies were seen strewn across the floors of badly damaged hospitals.
Daglo’s RSF emerged from the notorious Janjaweed that were unleashed in a scorched-earth campaign in Darfur from 2003 by former strongman Omar al-Bashir, who faces charges of war crimes and genocide.
The RSF include fighters who have seen battle in Yemen where they were sent to back a Saudi-led campaign supporting the government against Huthi rebels.
Further complicating Sudan’s battlefield situation, Central Reserve Police were being deployed on the side of the army across Khartoum to “protect citizens’ properties” from looting.
The US Treasury Department last year sanctioned the Central Reserve for “serious human rights abuses” related to “excessive force” against pro-democracy protests after the 2021 coup that brought Burhan and Daglo to power.
The UN has warned the unrest could plunge millions more into hunger in a country where 16 million people already needed aid to stave off famine.
Only 16 percent of Khartoum’s health facilities are functioning, says the UN World Health Organisation.
The fighting was pushing Sudan’s already ailing health sector toward “disaster”, warned the WHO’s regional director for the eastern Mediterranean, Ahmed al-Mandhari.
He warned of the growing threat of cholera, malaria and other diseases as the rainy season nears and safe water supplies are becoming scarce.
A first Red Cross plane yesterday took eight tonnes of medical supplies from Jordan to Port Sudan, which has served as an evacuation hub.
The UN World Food Programme has resumed activities in Sudan after over two weeks of suspension following the deaths of three of its aid workers.
Regional powers have joined negotiations to help end the violence.
An envoy of Burhan’s met yesterday in Riyadh with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, who called for the restoration of calm in Sudan.
Egypt, in an Arab League emergency meeting in Cairo, proposed a draft resolution Monday that called for an “immediate and comprehensive cessation” of fighting.
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It’s a stain on humanity that we don’t have a UN that’s fit for purpose .
How’s it not fit for purpose
@Gavin Lynam: he doesn’t really know, I suspect.
“Helping hand for Sudanese in Ireland”
We must open our homes. There will be millions displaced from this war.
Open Ireland up
@shuttleJohn: very bad trolling seriously
This war appears to be a proxy war (not like the Ukraine war) as the Wagner group is involved. Euronews says “According to a number of international investigations, the Wagner Group’s goal in Sudan is to provide Moscow access to resources, which, Russia then uses to finance the war in Ukraine. One of its main objectives is acquiring gold, as Sudan is the third largest producer of the mineral in Africa”
@Paul Furey: Maybe the west/left/powers that be are annoyed that it’s not the CIA or or some other pro west agency are not installed there. African countries do not have to select one of ‘ours’ just because we think we’re better. If it was a western funded group in Sudan instead of Wagner, they would no doubt also plunder and pillage as we’ve always done. Indeed, the ‘west’ have not done well by Africa in broad terms. Oh and to your point, the war in Ukraine is a proxy war from the west to the east all under the guise of ‘we care’.
@Chris Thaunton: Egypt is backing the military…Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are backing the paramilitaries. German companies have being supplying arms to the military side. Yes it is a proxy war…Just another conflict in Africa.. All because what lays under the ground that the people walk on.
The dark, scùmmy hand of the Kremlin all over this conflict. A stain on humanity.
800,000 fleeing, in a country of over 40 million and the two opposing sides have less than half a million soldiers between them. The millions that are surely on the side of democracy should get organised.
Peacefully headed our way, peacefully.
Fair enough! But some posters write too much and it gets in the way Imo.
have your say