Showing posts with label cholera. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cholera. Show all posts

Saturday, August 16, 2025

South Sudan: UNSC Briefing and Consultations

THE security situation has remained tense since clashes erupted in March. 


The South Sudan People’s Defence Forces (SSPDF) has continued operations, including ground offensive and aerial bombardments against opposition-held areas and other armed groups, including in the Greater Upper Nile and Greater Equatoria regions. 


The ceasefire agreed to in the revitalised agreement has effectively collapsed, with force unification stalled amid ongoing SSPDF offensives, as well as defections to and recruitment by the SSPDF. 


Intercommunal violence has further aggravated insecurity, resulting in hundreds of civilian casualties in the Greater Bahr el Ghazal region, according to the Secretary-General’s report.


At Monday’s meeting, several Council members are expected to raise the country’s dire humanitarian situation, including rising food insecurity. 


These challenges have been compounded by flooding and a collapsing healthcare system amid a severe cholera outbreak


The country also continues to grapple with the adverse humanitarian, security, and economic effects of the ongoing fighting in Sudan and the resulting influx of refugees and South Sudanese returnees.


Impediments to humanitarian access, including attacks on humanitarian workers and looting of humanitarian assets, are another matter of concern for Council members.


Read more in Security Council Report
By What's In Blue 
Dated Friday 15 August 2025
South Sudan: Briefing and Consultations


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Wednesday, August 13, 2025

Sudan: Starving children dying. Rare footage shows plight of civilians in besieged El Fasher, North Darfur

INTERNATIONAL NGOs working in Sudan issued an urgent statement this week declaring that "sustained attacks, obstruction of aid and targeting of critical infrastructure demonstrate a deliberate strategy to break the civilian population through hunger, fear, and exhaustion".


They said that "anecdotal reports of recent food hoarding for military use add to the suffering of civilians". Read more in the following report.


From BBC News
By Barbara Plett Usher
Africa correspondent, BBC News
Dated Wednesday, 13 August 2025 - full copy:

 'Our children are dying' - rare footage shows plight of civilians in besieged Sudan city

01:23

Media caption,

WATCH: BBC obtains rare video from inside besieged el-Fasher in Sudan


The women at the community kitchen in the besieged Sudanese city of el-Fasher are sitting in huddles of desperation.


"Our children are dying before our eyes," one of them tells the BBC.


"We don't know what to do. They are innocent. They have nothing to do with the army or [its paramilitary rival] the Rapid Support Forces. Our suffering is worse than what you can imagine."


Food is so scarce in el-Fasher that prices have soared to the point where money that used to cover a week's worth of meals can now buy only one. International aid organisations have condemned the "calculated use of starvation as a weapon of war".


The BBC has obtained rare footage of people still trapped in the city, sent to us by a local activist and filmed by a freelance cameraman.


The Sudanese army has been battling the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) for more than two years after their commanders jointly staged a coup, and then fell out.


El-Fasher, in the western Darfur region, is one of the most brutal frontlines in the conflict.

Image caption, This may be the only meal these children get for a day


The hunger crisis is compounded by a surge of cholera sweeping through the squalid camps of those displaced by the fighting, which escalated this week into one of the most intense RSF attacks on the city yet.


The paramilitaries tightened their 14-month blockade after losing control of the capital Khartoum earlier this year, and stepped up their battle for el-Fasher, the last foothold of the armed forces in Darfur.


In the north and centre of the country where the army has wrestled back territory from the RSF, food and medical aid have begun to make a dent in civilian suffering.


But the situation is desperate in the conflict zones of western and southern Sudan.


At the Matbakh-al-Khair communal kitchen in el-Fasher late last month, volunteers turned ambaz into a porridge. This is the residue of peanuts after the oil has been extracted, normally fed to animals.


Sometimes it is possible to find sorghum or millet but on the day of filming, the kitchen manager says: "There is no flour or bread."


"Now we've reached the point of eating ambaz. May God relieve us of this calamity, there's nothing left in the market to buy," he adds.


The UN has amplified its appeal for a humanitarian pause to allow food convoys into the city, with its Sudan envoy Sheldon Yett once more demanding this week that the warring sides observe their obligations under international law.


The army has given clearance for the trucks to proceed but the UN is still waiting for official word from the paramilitary group.


RSF advisers have said they believed the truce would be used to facilitate the delivery of food and ammunition to the army's "besieged militias" inside el-Fasher.


They have also claimed the paramilitary group and its allies were setting up "safe routes" for civilians to leave the city.


Local responders in el-Fasher can receive some emergency cash via a digital banking system, but it does not go very far.


"The prices in the markets have exploded," says Mathilde Vu, advocacy manager for the Norwegian Refugee Council.


"Today, $5,000 [£3,680] covers one meal for 1,500 people in a single day. Three months ago, the same amount could feed them for an entire week."


Doctors say people are dying of malnutrition. It is impossible to know how many - one report quoting a regional health official put the number at more than 60 last week.

BBC "The situation, it is so miserable, it is so catastrophic" -Ibrahim Abdullah Khater, Paediatrician


Hospitals cannot cope. Few are still operating. They have been damaged by shelling and are short of medical supplies to help both the starving, and those injured in the continual bombardment.


"We have many malnourished children admitted in hospital but unfortunately there is no single sachet of [therapeutic food]," says Dr Ibrahim Abdullah Khater, a paediatrician at the Al Saudi Hospital, noting that the five severely malnourished children currently in the ward also have medical complications.


"They are just waiting for their death," he says.


When hunger crises hit, those who usually die first are the most vulnerable, the least healthy or those suffering from pre-existing conditions.


"The situation, it is so miserable, it is so catastrophic," the doctor tells us in a voice message.


"The children of el-Fasher are dying on a daily basis due to lack of food, lack of medicine. Unfortunately, the international community is just watching."


International non-governmental organisations working in Sudan issued an urgent statement, external this week declaring that "sustained attacks, obstruction of aid and targeting of critical infrastructure demonstrate a deliberate strategy to break the civilian population through hunger, fear, and exhaustion".


They said that "anecdotal reports of recent food hoarding for military use add to the suffering of civilians".


"There is no safe passage out of the city, with roads blocked and those attempting to flee facing attacks, taxation at checkpoints, community-based discrimination and death," the organisations said.


Hundreds of thousands of people did flee in recent months, many from the Zamzam displaced persons camp at the edge of el-Fasher, seized by the RSF in April.


They arrive in Tawila, a town 60km (37 miles) west of the city, weak and dehydrated, with accounts of violence and extortion along the road from RSF-allied groups.


Life is safer in the crowded camps, but they are stalked by disease - most deadly of all: cholera.


It is caused by polluted water and has killed hundreds in Sudan, triggered by the destruction of water infrastructure and lack of food and medical care, and made worse by flooding due to the rainy season.

Image caption, Makeshift centres have been built to treat patients who have cholera


Unlike el-Fasher, in Tawila aid workers at least have access, but their supplies are limited, says John Joseph Ocheibi, the on-site project coordinator for a group called The Alliance for International Medical Action.


"We have shortages in terms of [washing facilities], in terms of medical supplies, to be able to deal with this situation," he tells the BBC. "We are mobilizing resources to see how best we can be able to respond."


Sylvain Penicaud of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) estimates there are only three litres of water per person per day in the camps, which, he says, is "way below the basic need, and forces people to get water from contaminated sources".


Zubaida Ismail Ishaq is lying in the tent clinic. She is seven months pregnant, gaunt and exhausted. Her story is a tale of trauma told by many.


She tells us she used to trade when she had a little money, before fleeing el-Fasher.


Her husband was captured by armed men on the road to Tawila. Her daughter has a head injury.


Zubaida and her mother came down with cholera shortly after arriving in the camp.


"We drink water without boiling it," she says. "We have no-one to get us water. Since coming here, I have nothing left."


Back in el-Fasher we hear appeals for help from the women clustered at the soup kitchen - any kind of help.


"We're exhausted. We want this siege lifted," says Faiza Abkar Mohammed. "Even if they airdrop food, airdrop anything - we're completely exhausted."


Sudan war: A simple guide to what is happening


You may also be interested in:

'I lost a baby and then rescued a child dodging air strikes in Sudan's civil war'
Oil-rich Sudanese region becomes new focus of war between army and rival forces
Sudan in danger of self-destructing as conflict and famine reign


View original: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/czxp0qyn6dqo


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Saturday, July 19, 2025

Sudan's former prime minister Abdalla Hamdok says recent military gains won't end the country's conflict

HAMDOK, a 69-year-old former economist who now leads a civilian coalition from exile, called the idea that the conflict was drawing down “total nonsense.” The idea that reconstruction can begin in Khartoum while fighting rages elsewhere is “absolutely ridiculous,” he said.


“Any attempt at creating a government in Sudan today is fake. It is irrelevant,” he said, arguing that lasting peace can't be secured without addressing the root causes of the war. Read more.


From The Associated Press (AP)

By SAM METZ

North Africa reporter for AP

Dated 05 June 2025; 2:06 AM BST - full copy:


Former Prime Minister Hamdok says the military’s recent gains won’t end Sudan’s civil war


Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok speaks during a session of the summit to support Sudan, at the Grand Palais Ephemere in Paris on May 17, 2021. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena, Pool, File)


MARRAKECH, Morocco (AP) — Sudan’s former prime minister on Wednesday dismissed the military’s moves to form a new government as “fake,” saying its recent victories in recapturing the capital Khartoum and other territory will not end the country’s two-year civil war.


In a rare interview with The Associated Press, Abdalla Hamdok said no military victory, in Khartoum or elsewhere, could end the war that has killed tens of thousands and driven millions from their homes.


“Whether Khartoum is captured or not captured, it’s irrelevant,” Hamdok said on the sidelines of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation’s governance conference in Morocco. “There is no military solution to this. No side will be able to have outright victory.”


Hamdok became Sudan’s first civilian prime minister after decades of military rule in 2019, trying to lead a democratic transition. He resigned in January 2022 after a turbulent stretch in which he was ousted in a coup and briefly reinstated amid international pressure.


The following year, warring generals plunged the country into civil war. Sudan today bears the grim distinction of being home to some of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.


Fighting between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces has left at least 24,000 dead, though many believe the true toll is far worse.


Both sides stand accused of war crimes.


The RSF, with roots in Darfur’s notorious Janjaweed militia, has been accused of carrying out genocide. The army is accused of unleashing chemical weapons and targeting civilians where they live.


The war has driven about 13 million people from their homes, including 4 million who have crossed into neighboring countries. Famine is setting in and cholera is sweeping through.


The military recaptured the Khartoum area from the RSF in March, as well as some surrounding territory. Army chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan has framed the advances as a major turning point in the conflict.


Last month, he appointed a new prime minister, Kamil al-Taib Idris, for the first time since the war began, tasked with forming a new government. But the fighting has continued. The RSF has regrouped in its stronghold in Darfur and made advances elsewhere, including in Kordofan.


Hamdok, a 69-year-old former economist who now leads a civilian coalition from exile, called the idea that the conflict was drawing down “total nonsense.” The idea that reconstruction can begin in Khartoum while fighting rages elsewhere is “absolutely ridiculous,” he said.


“Any attempt at creating a government in Sudan today is fake. It is irrelevant,” he said, arguing that lasting peace can’t be secured without addressing the root causes of the war.


Hamdok said a ceasefire and a credible process to restore democratic, civilian rule would need to confront Sudan’s deep inequalities, including uneven development, issues among different identity groups and questions about the role of religion in government.


“Trusting the soldiers to bring democracy is a false pretense,” he added.


Though rooted in longstanding divisions, the war has been supercharged by foreign powers accused of arming both sides.


Pro-democracy groups, including Hamdok’s Somoud coalition, have condemned atrocities committed by both the army and the RSF. Hamdok, however, has avoided accusing the United Arab Emirates of supplying weapons to the RSF, even amid international scrutiny and an investigation from a U.N. panel of experts.


On Wednesday, he rebuffed AP questions about weapons coming from the UAE. He said those who singled out the Gulf state while ignoring others accused of backing the army, including Iran, were “pushing a narrative.”


“What we would like to see is anybody who is supplying arms to any side to stop,” he said.


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Sudan's military accepts UN ceasefire proposal to let aid in




View original:


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