UNHCR warns that “more than a million people could leave Sudan in the next six months”
May 17. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The United Nations has indicated this Wednesday that more than 3,000 million dollars (around 2,765 million euros) are necessary to deliver humanitarian aid to those affected by the conflict between the Sudanese Army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), as well as as well as the refugees who have fled the fighting to other countries in the region.
The Humanitarian Response Plan for Sudan has been revised with respect to the one presented in December 2022 due to the increase in needs due to the hostilities, for which it currently amounts to 2,560 million dollars (about 2,360 million euros) — 800 million dollars (about 738 million euros) more than the first– to help 18 million people in Sudan, a figure to which 470.4 million dollars (approximately 434 million euros) are added to give help refugees, returnees and host communities in countries of the region.
“This conflict is a cruel blow to the people of Sudan, already reeling under the weight of a desperate humanitarian situation. The desire, willingness and impatience of humanitarian agencies to respond is as strong as ever. “, explained the United Nations Assistant Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs, Martin Griffiths.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, has emphasized that “more than a month after the start of the crisis, an uncountable number of people remain terrified inside Sudan, and those who have fled through the Many of the country’s borders need help, often in places where access is extremely difficult and sources are limited.”
“Aid workers are working hard to respond, but we need, once again, to call on countries and individuals with the means to step up to provide the necessary resources to help people who have lost everything.” , has indicated.
In this sense, Ramesh Rajasingham, representative of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Geneva and director of the organization’s Coordination Division, pointed out that “when the humanitarian aid plan for Sudan 2023 was presented there were already more than 15.8 million people in need of humanitarian aid, a third of the population and the highest number in a decade.”
“The conflict that broke out on April 15 has been a cruel blow to the people of Sudan,” Rajasingham lamented during the presentation of the plan, while stressing that there are “enormous challenges” to be able to deliver aid. In this sense, he has emphasized the need to increase the delivery of this aid to meet the growing needs of the victims.
For his part, the UNHCR Deputy Commissioner for Operations, Raouf Mazou, stressed that “the scale and magnitude of displacement in Sudan and neighboring countries has continued to increase since the outbreak of the conflict” and has detailed that there are currently 220,000 refugees. and returned to Chad, South Sudan, Egypt, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Ethiopia. Thus, he has specified that 150,000 of them are Sudanese refugees, while 70,000 are “former refugees in Sudan who return to their countries in adverse conditions.”
Mazou has highlighted “the importance of the asylum that is being given by neighboring countries”, which he has thanked for “keeping the borders open”, before warning that “more than a million people could leave Sudan during the next six months.” “Getting funding in the current international context will be very difficult, but the funds are urgently needed and we look forward to your support,” she concluded.
The revised plan will focus on delivering food, water and hygiene products to those affected, while increasing its focus on protection, including that given to children, and the prevention of gender-based violence. In addition, it will help host countries to coordinate the response to support host governments and communities, with a multisectoral strategy and financial requests from 140 partners to provide protection and humanitarian aid to refugees.
The hostilities broke out in the context of an increase in tensions around the integration of the RSF into the Armed Forces, a key part of an agreement signed in December to form a new civilian government and reactivate the transition open after the overthrow in 2019 of the then president, Omar Hasan al Bashir, damaged by the coup in October 2021, in which the prime minister of unity, Abdalá Hamdok, was overthrown.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) affirmed on Sunday that the fighting between the Army and the RSF had so far left more than 675 dead, more than 5,500 injured and almost a million internally displaced or refugees to countries neighbors in the region, although the Sudan Doctors Union has raised the number of deaths in the framework of the hostilities to more than 820.
