Famine is spreading in war-torn Sudan, a UN-backed report says | Sudan war news

The IPC report found famine in five areas, including Zamzam, the largest IDP camp in Sudan’s North Darfur state.

It is spreading because of famine in Sudan war A United Nations-backed global hunger monitoring group says it is between the military and a paramilitary group.

The Integrated Food Insecurity Phase Classification (IPC) Famine Control Committee released a report on Tuesday citing hunger in five regions, including Zamzam, the largest IDP camp in Sudan’s North Darfur state.

Famine has been confirmed in two IDP camps, Abu Shuk and al-Salam, in al-Fasher, the besieged capital of North Darfur in western Sudan, as well as in settled and displaced communities in the Nuba Mountains in southern Sudan. to the report.

The five-member committee also found that the famine, which was first detected in August, will spread to five more regions by May – Um Qadadah, Melit, el-Fasher, Tawisha and al-Lait. It also identified 17 other regions in Sudan that are at risk of famine.

According to the IPC report, 24.6 million Sudanese – half the population – face acute food insecurity.

“(The war) has caused unprecedented mass displacement, a collapsing economy, disruption of basic social services, severe social disruption and poor access to humanitarian aid.”

The IPC, an independent body funded by Western nations, is made up of more than a dozen UN agencies, aid groups and governments that use its monitoring as a global reference for analyzing food and nutrition crises.

The report was published despite the Sudanese government’s continued disruption of the IPC’s malnutrition analysis process. On Monday, the government announced it was suspending its participation in the global hunger monitoring system, saying the IPC had issued “discredited reports that undermine Sudan’s sovereignty and dignity.”

Sudan has been rocked by a 20-month-long war that has killed people More than 24,000 people According to the UN, more than 14 million people – about 30 percent of the population – were driven from their homes. An estimated 3.2 million Sudanese have moved to neighboring countries, including Chad, Egypt and South Sudan.

The war broke out in April 2023 amid prolonged tensions between the army and the army Militarized Rapid Support Force It turned into open fighting in the capital, Khartoum, before spreading to other urban areas and western Darfur.

According to the UN and human rights groups, the conflict has been marked by atrocities, including ethnically motivated killings and rapes. The International Criminal Court investigates alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The IPC added in its report that military operations in conflict zones can severely disrupt agriculture, resulting in workers abandoning their crops. Farms also suffered from the looting and killing of livestock.

“Displaced households, especially those living in townships and public buildings, are unlikely to benefit significantly from the harvest.”

Dervla Cleary, the UN’s senior emergency and rehabilitation officer at the Food and Agriculture Organization, said the situation in Sudan was “simply terrible”.

“This is unacceptable in today’s world,” Cleary told the Associated Press news agency. “We need an end to the violence so people can have access to food, water, health, nutrition and agriculture.”

Sudan is the third country where famine has been declared in the last 15 years. The other two are South Sudan and Somalia.