More than 25 million people in Sudan are facing a humanitarian crisis as fighting continues to grip the northeast African nation, the UN Refugee Agency warned on Tuesday.
Thousands of refugees are fleeing the conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on a daily basis. The majority are reportedly seeking refuge in South Sudan.
According to Olga Sarrado, a spokesperson for UNHCR (Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees), the total number of displaced has now exceeded 8.5 million people, “with 1.8 million of them crossing borders.”
Marie-Helene Verney, UNHCR’s representative in South Sudan, highlighted the scale of the crisis: “If we’re talking about Germany, that would be 4.5 million people arriving in one year, in less than one year, and if we’re talking about the United States, that would be 17.6 million people arriving in less than one year.”
Earlier in March, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk stated that “almost half of the population… are in urgent need of food and medical aid.”
Clashes between the SAF and the paramilitary RSF erupted in mid-April last year. The UN says at least 14,600 people have been killed and 26,000 others injured in 11 months of fighting across the nation.