Sudan attack on aid convoy kills five: UN

Aid

Port Sudan – Five aid workers have been killed in an attack on a convoy headed for Sudan’s besieged city of El-Fasher, where famine looms after more than two years of war, the UN said Tuesday.

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres called for a probe into the latest assault on humanitarian aid in war-torn Sudan, which was reported as the world body announced a “devastating milestone” of four million people fleeing across borders in over two years of war.

The 15-truck convoy organised by the World Food Programme and UNICEF came under attack on Monday near Al-Koma village in North Darfur state, the UN agencies said in a joint statement.

The attack killed five members of the convoy and left several others injured while “multiple trucks were burned and critical humanitarian supplies were damaged”, the statement said.

The UN agencies did not specify who was behind the assault, which took place in an area controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which has been at war with the regular army since April 2023.

Guterres’ spokesperson condemned the attack as a “horrendous act of violence against humanitarian personnel”.

“These are violations under international humanitarian law, and we call for an urgent investigation and for the perpetrators to be held to account,” Stephane Dujarric told reporters.

The two warring sides, which have both been accused of using starvation as a weapon of war and looting or obstructing aid, traded blame for the attack.

‘Fleeing in terror’

The convoy was delivering aid from the wartime capital of Port Sudan, about 1,800 kilometres (1,118 miles) to the east of El-Fasher.

It was “negotiating access to complete the journey to El-Fasher when it was attacked”, the UN agencies said.

Parties “on the ground were notified and aware of the location of the trucks”, they added.

The army-aligned government said the trucks hit on Monday were targeted by drones from the RSF, which in turn accused the army of carrying out the attack with military aircraft.

Since the war began, Africa’s third-largest country has been engulfed by what the UN has called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with more than a million people on the brink of starvation in North Darfur state alone.

The fighting has killed tens of thousands of people, uprooted 13 million and created dire hunger and displacement crises.

Four million people have fled across Sudan’s borders, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said on Tuesday.

“It’s a devastating milestone in what is the world’s most damaging displacement crisis,” UNHCR spokeswoman Eujin Byun told a press briefing in Geneva.

“If the conflict continues, thousands more people will continue to flee, putting regional and global stability at stake.”

UNHCR described a deepening humanitarian emergency in neighbouring Chad, on the western border with Sudan, where attacks in North Darfur have sent tens of thousands fleeing.

In just over a month, 68,556 refugees have arrived in Chad’s Wadi Fira and Ennedi Est provinces, with an average of 1,400 people crossing the border daily in recent days, he said.

“These civilians are fleeing in terror, many under fire, navigating armed checkpoints, extortion, and tight restrictions imposed by armed groups,” said Dossou Patrice Ahouansou, UNHCR’s principal situation coordinator in Chad.

Fight for control 

Paramilitary attacks in North Darfur have intensified in recent months as the RSF seeks to consolidate its hold on all of Darfur after losing Sudan’s capital Khartoum in March.

The UN has repeatedly sounded the alarm over the plight of civilians in state capital El-Fasher, the only major city in the Darfur region outside RSF control, which has been under a brutal siege by the paramilitaries for more than a year.

Since April, RSF shelling on the city and its surrounding famine-stricken displacement camps has killed hundreds of civilians and displaced hundreds of thousands.

On Thursday, the WFP said its facility in El-Fasher had been “hit and damaged by RSF repeated shelling”.

The war has effectively split Sudan in two: the army holds the north, east and centre while the RSF dominates nearly all of Darfur and the country’s south.

Famine has been declared in five areas across Sudan, including three displacement camps near El-Fasher and other parts of the country’s south.

It has been all but confirmed in El-Fasher itself, where aid agencies say a lack of access to data has prevented an official famine declaration.

Across the country, nearly 25 million people are suffering dire food insecurity.

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Source: AFP

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