SUDAN: MORE THAN 136,000 DISPLACED BY SPREAD OF WAR, SAYS UN

Fri 05 July 2024:

More than 136,000 people have fled Sudan’s Sennar state in the south-east of the country since the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces began a series of attacks on towns, the UN said on Wednesday. This is the latest wave of displacement caused by Sudan’s almost 15-month long civil war, Reuters has reported.

They join nearly 10 million people driven from their homes since war broke out between the RSF and the Sudanese army in April last year. The war has sparked accusations of “ethnic cleansing” and warnings of famine, mainly in RSF-controlled areas across the country.

The RSF began a campaign on 24 June to seize the city of Sennar, a trading hub, but quickly turned to the smaller towns of Sinjah and Al-Dinder. This prompted an exodus of civilians from all three, mainly to neighbouring Al-Gedaref and Blue Nile states. Images on social media showed people of all ages wading across the Blue Nile.

Activists in both states say that there is little shelter or food aid for the incomers. In Gedaref, they faced downpours of heavy rain while stranded in the state capital’s main market with no tents or blankets after schools that had served as displacement centres were emptied by the government, explained the local resistance committee.

The UN’s International Organisation for Migration said that since 24 June, an estimated total of 136,130 people have been displaced in Sennar. The state was already home to more than 285,000 people displaced from Khartoum and Al-Gezira states, meaning that many of those leaving over the past two weeks were likely to have been displaced for the second or third time. It also said that villages in Gedaref state, one of several possible targets for the RSF campaign, had also seen an exodus.

To the west of the country, local activists said that at least 12 people were killed by artillery fire on a livestock market on Wednesday in the city of Al-Fashir, which has seen a months-long fight for control and people fleeing to nearby towns and displacement camps.

-MEMO

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