New York / London / El Fasher / Zamzam Camp / Abu Shouk Camp — The United Nations has warned of famine, mass killings, and a fast-spreading cholera outbreak in Sudan, saying civilians face “a deepening crisis”. The warning came as the Darfur Union in the United Kingdom accused the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and allied factions of committing “genocide” in El Fasher, North Darfur, during what it called their 227th failed attempt to seize the city.
UN Spokesman Stéphane Dujarric told reporters yesterday, “civilians are enduring a deepening crisis with ongoing attacks, acute hunger and starvation.”
He cited the Director of OCHA’s Operations and Advocacy Division, Edem Wosornu, who “expressed alarm over reports from the besieged city of El Fasher in North Darfur state that more than 60 people died from malnutrition in just one week, and most of them, as one can imagine, belong to vulnerable groups such as women and children.”
Famine was first detected a year ago in the Zamzam displacement camp “and is expected to have expanded to other areas since,” he said. Dujarric also voiced grave concern over an August 7 attack in North Kordofan state that killed 18 civilians and wounded dozens.
Nearly 100,000 cholera cases have been recorded in Sudan since July last year. In North Darfur, over 5,300 suspected and confirmed cases and 84 deaths have been reported since 21 June, “most of them in Tawila locality, where 330,000 people displaced from Zamzam and El Fasher are sheltering in dire conditions.” Overcrowding, poor sanitation, and heavy rains are accelerating the spread, he warned.
‘227th attempt to invade’
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In a statement released yesterday, the Darfur Union UK alleged that forces led by El Taher Hajar and El Hadi Idris “joined hands once again with the UAE-backed Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in their 227th attempt to invade and occupy the city of El Fasher.”
It accused the RSF of massacring more than 40 people and injuring 19 in the Abu Shouk displacement camp, calling it “a deliberate escalation of the genocidal siege aimed at breaking the will of the city through bloodshed and terror.”
The group urged the world to “hold the UAE, the RSF, and all their collaborators accountable for genocide, starvation, and the siege of El Fasher” and to sanction “every individual, group, and entity linked to this campaign of extermination.”
“The people of El Fasher have resisted 227 attempts to destroy them,” the statement concluded. “They will resist the 228th, and every attack after, until this genocidal project is defeated.”
