The violence poses an extreme and immediate danger to the 800,000 civilians residing in el-Fasher.
Senior United Nations officials on April 19 warned the Security Council of the risk of new fronts and flashpoints emerging in Sudan, around the town of El-Fasher in Darfur, where many people are on the brink of starvation.
“After a year of war between the Armed Forces (SAF) of General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and the Rapid Support Forces (FSR) under the command of General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, Sudan is experiencing a large-scale crisis that is entirely man-made,” Rosemary DiCarlo, UN Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, said.
“The warring parties have ignored repeated calls to cease hostilities. Instead, they have stepped up preparations for further fighting, with both the SAF and RSF continuing recruitment campaigns among the civilian population,” Ms. DiCarlo noted.
In particular, Ms. DiCarlo expressed concern about reports of an “imminent” attack by RSF on El-Fasher, the capital in Darfur that the force does not control, “raising fears of a new front in the conflict.”
El-Fasher acts as a humanitarian hub for Darfur, home to about a quarter of Sudan's 48 million people.
Until recently, the area had been relatively unaffected by fighting, hosting a large number of refugees. But since mid-April this year, bombings and fighting have occurred in several surrounding locations.
“There have been repeated reports of clashes in the east and north of El-Fasher, resulting in the displacement of more than 36,000 people,” said Edem Wosornu, director of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. “Doctors Without Borders has treated more than 100 casualties in El-Facher in recent days. The total number of civilian casualties could be much higher.”
“The violence poses an extreme and immediate danger to the 800,000 civilians residing in el-Fasher. It risks causing further casualties in other parts of Darfur,” Ms. Wosornu warned.
For her part, Ms. DiCarlo added that the fighting in el-Fasher “could spark bloody conflicts between communities across Darfur” and further impede the delivery of humanitarian aid in a region “already on the brink of famine.”
The new conflict in Sudan, which began on April 15, 2023, has claimed thousands of lives and displaced more than 8.5 million people, according to the United Nations.
Source
Comment (0)