A picture taken on March 20, 2024, shows children who fled Khartoum and Jazira states in war-torn Sudan standing near tents at a camp for the internally displaced in southern Gadaref state.Despite grim warnings that Sudan could suffer a million deaths from war and famine this year, an appeal for humanitarian aid has reached less than 5 per cent of its target, diplomats and relief agencies say.
“Everybody understands that this crisis is barrelling towards a point of no return,” said Tom Perriello, the U.S. special envoy for Sudan, at a media briefing on Thursday. “A humanitarian travesty is playing out in Sudan under a veil of international inattention and inaction,” said Edem Wosornu, director of operations at the UN’s humanitarian office, at a UN Security Council meeting on Wednesday. “Simply put, we are failing the people of Sudan.”
While authorities recently allowed a convoy of 60 trucks to enter Sudan with food aid, most humanitarian access is still blocked by the Sudanese military and the RSF, inflicting starvation on the country, he said. Mr. Perriello, who was appointed by U.S. President Joe Biden late last month, is on a seven-country tour of African and Middle Eastern countries. Sudanese people who have fled to those countries have told him that the situation is “hell on Earth,” he said.
Carl Skau, deputy executive director of the UN’s food agency, the World Food Program, said the emergency relief operations are severely hampered by blockades that prevent aid from crossing the war’s conflict lines.