FAMINE is ravaging Sudan.
The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) – which claims to be the government of Sudan – took a small step towards alleviating that famine earlier this week by allowing 15 UN aid lorries to cross the border from Chad to bring food to the starving.
Aid agencies hope that it opens the door to a full-scale relief effort that can save millions of lives.
But they fear it is just a symbolic concession – too little and too late.
Four weeks ago, the UN-accredited Integrated food security Phase Classification (IPC) system said that famine conditions existed in parts of Darfur, Sudan’s westernmost region.
This was no surprise.
Sudan’s humanitarian catastrophe has been the largest in the world for many months. More than half of Sudan’s 45 million people need urgent relief aid.
More than 12 million are displaced, including nearly two million refugees in neighbouring countries – Chad, Egypt, and South Sudan.
Some food security specialists fear that as many as 2.5 million people could die from hunger by the end of this year.
While the roots of Sudan’s hunger lie in decades of economic mismanagement, the legacy of devastating wars, and drought made worse by climate crisis the trigger for today’s famine is the use of starvation as a weapon.
War erupted in April last year between the SAF, under Gen Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) led by Gen Mohamed Hamdan Dagolo, known as “Hemedti”.
The war soon devastated Sudanese communities.
