Sudan crisis: It is not safe to ask refugees where the men have gone, UN aid groups say

From the World Food Program (WFP), Chad Country Director Pierre Honnorat said that 20,000 people crossed into Chad last week.

Speaking to journalists via Zoom from the Zabout refugee camp in Goz Beida, Mr. Honnorat described the desperate scenes: “We can see that they have suffered, many family members are missing, and we don’t even dare to ask asked them, ‘Where are the men? ?’ The response from mothers is often that they are killed. So, you just see a lot of women, a lot of children. “

The new arrivals are among more than 230,000 refugees and 38,000 returnees who have been uprooted by deadly conflicts in the Darfur states of western Sudan.

‘We need support, not hope’

Many are seriously injured and have harrowing stories of the violence they have experienced, Mr. Honnorat said, as he appealed for financial support to help those currently fighting in Sudan, which started on the fifteenth day of the fourth month, and they have marked the use of heavy weapons. airstrikes involving rival military forces.

“This is never over,” said the WFP official. “We really need support. It’s not about hope anymore. We give them hope, safety, but they need to eat every day. The situation is really important.”

In order to scale the WFP response on the Chad-Sudan border, the UN agency needs at least $13 million a month.

Die in food companies

Immediate priorities include treating the wounded and helping malnourished children who are in danger of crossing from Darfur to Chad. According to the WFP, one in ten youths who have been displaced from Sudan do not have food to eat.

“Every week children are dying in food factories; This is true,” said Mr. Honnorat. “Malnutrition rates for children are now too high, and we need to act quickly in prevention to ensure that those who are under so-called moderate to severe malnutrition can get what they need quickly so that they do not fall into severe malnutrition.”

According to the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, the conflict has displaced more than 2.5 million people inside Sudan and across borders to neighboring countries. Before the crisis began, there were 1.1 million refugees in Sudan, mainly from South Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Syria.

The latest data from UNHCR indicates that Chad has opened its borders to more than 190,000 refugees, second only to Egypt, which shelters more than 250,000.

‘Hence the low funding’

In recent weeks, WFP has built six temporary health units, with two now being used as a manual hospital and for medical logistics, and four as transit points for new refugees crossing into Chad.

“I have rarely seen such a serious crisis with so little funding,” said the WFP country director. “I am still at the border, on the bridge, what is left of the bridge. It is a constant stream and those who are coming now are in much worse conditions than those who arrived in the first days. “

Many of those who arrived in Chad from Darfur were seriously injured amid reports that fleeing civilians have been targeted with increasing ethnic scale to the violence.