The UN World Food Program (WFP) said on Friday it was receiving reports of people dying of starvation in Sudan and that the number of hungry people has doubled over the past year as a war has cut off civilians from aid.
The WFP called on Sudan’s warring parties, the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), to urgently “provide immediate guarantees for the safe and unimpeded delivery of humanitarian food assistance to conflict-hit parts of Sudan.”
“Almost 18 million individuals across the country are currently facing acute hunger (IPC3+),” while “an estimated five million people are experiencing emergency levels of hunger (IPC phase 4)” in areas worst affected by the conflict.
“WFP is currently only able to regularly deliver food assistance to 1 in 10 people facing emergency levels of hunger (IPC phase 4) in Sudan. These people are trapped in conflict hotspots, including Khartoum, Darfur, Kordofan, and now Gezira,” where the RSF Recently advanced.
"It is becoming nearly impossible for aid agencies to cross due to security threats, enforced roadblocks, and demands for fees and taxation," the WFP statement said.
The war in Sudan began in April 2023 when a power struggle between the army and the RSF erupted over a plan to shift towards civilian rule.
The two sides shared power with civilians after the overthrow of former leader Omar al-Bashir in 2019 before derailing that transition by staging a coup together in 2021.
Efforts to negotiate and end the fighting have so far yielded no breakthrough.
The WFP said it was trying to obtain security guarantees to restart operations in El Gezira, previously an aid hub that many had fled to from Khartoum.
Aid deliveries in Sudan had been limited because 70 trucks had been stuck in Port Sudan for over two weeks in January waiting for clearances, and another 31 WFP trucks have been parked empty and have been unable to leave El Obeid for over three months.
“Every single one of our trucks needs to be on the road each and every day delivering food to the Sudanese people,” said Eddie Rowe, WFP Sudan Representative and Country Director in Sudan.
“Yet life-saving assistance is not reaching those who need it the most, and we are already receiving reports of people dying of starvation,” Rowe added.
Under a classification agreed upon by a partnership of UN agencies and NGOs, crisis levels of hunger mean households suffer from high rates of acute malnutrition or can only meet minimum needs through crisis-coping strategies or using essential assets.
Emergency levels of hunger mean households are suffering from very high acute malnutrition or death or can only cope through emergency measures or liquidating assets.
