Sudan’s famine could have been averted – but the West looked away

While the world focuses on the Middle East, war in Sudan between the army and rival paramilitaries has pushed the Zamzam camp near Darfur’s besieged city of El-Fasher into famine. That’s according to a UN-backed assessment. Of course, the roots of the crisis lie partly in the West – which is now trying to look the other way.

Sudan: “famine is now ongoing”

The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) review, which is used by UN agencies, found that “famine is ongoing in July 2024 in Zamzam camp”. It said:

The main drivers of famine in Zamzam camp are conflict and lack of humanitarian access.

The World Food Programme (WFP) said:

UNICEF and the UN World Food Programme (WFP) have been warning of the escalating risk to the people of Sudan, particularly children, if urgent aid cannot be delivered to communities trapped in conflict hotspots like Darfur, Khartoum, Kordofan and Al Jazirah.

UNICEF’s executive director Catherine Russell said:

This famine is fully man-made. We again call on all the parties to provide the humanitarian system with unimpeded and safe access to children and families in need. We must be able to use all routes, across lines of conflict and borders. Sudan’s children cannot wait. They need protection, basic services and most of all, a ceasefire and peace.

26 millions people in Sudan are now struggling to get sufficient levels of food.

Dying of hunger

Aid group Plan International said that:

the IPC’s latest report confirms what we and our fellow humanitarians have feared for months: that children in Sudan, having endured more than a year of harrowing conflict, are now dying of hunger.

Zamzam, a displacement camp in North Darfur state which hosted some 300,000 people “has swollen to half a million people in just a few weeks” due to the fighting in nearby El-Fasher, said Mohammed Qazilbash of Plan International.

Many residents have fled brutal combat in the state capital El-Fasher, the only major city in Sudan’s vast western Darfur region not under paramilitary control.

Fighting erupted in April 2023 between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces after a plan to integrate them failed. Both sides have been accused of war crimes, including deliberately targeting civilians and blocking humanitarian aid. The war has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced more than 10 million, according to the United Nations.

As the country has been plunged into what the UN called “one of the worst humanitarian crises in recent memory”, the vast majority of relief operations have been suspended due to the violence.

Besieged

The IPC report noted that El-Fasher airport “is not accessible for humanitarian deliveries due to insecurity.” They also pointed out that the last “delivery of food assistance to Zamzam camp was in April”.

Medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said last month that 63,000 children in Zamzam camp “qualify as malnourished.” And, 10 percent of these children were “severely, acutely malnourished”.

Another aid group, Save the Children, warned on Thursday that:

in Sudan, time is running out to keep children alive. And yet parties to the conflict and those with international influence have failed to put an end to the fighting over and over again.”

Plan International’s director for Sudan warned:

This situation was entirely preventable, and the international community must not waste another moment. With the lean season under way, without urgent action, the number of children and families facing starvation will only grow,

The West’s clawed hand in Sudan

Of course, the international community – particularly the West – is in no small part to blame for the crisis. The International Monetary Fund (IMF), for example, has for decades imposed austerity on the country in return for funding.

As the People’s Dispatch wrote:

The IMF has long been involved with Sudan. To date, Sudan has undergone at least 11 IMF programs in between civil wars and conflicts. Between 1979 to 1985 alone, under Nimeiri’s regime, there were 5 IMF loan programs in Sudan. Outside of the programs, the IMF maintained counsel to the government, giving policy advice that would “help” Sudan’s creditworthiness and access to the international market.

From the start of their relationship,  Sudan has been in the weaker position.

Of course, the US and UK are also central to the crisis facing Sudan. As the Voice wrote:

Sudan has long been beset by foreign-influenced coups, and has suffered them every decade for the past 60 years.

Sudan is a former British colony, with London sharing control of the land with Egypt, before Sudan gained independence in 1956.

The region was the scene of many local wars backed by US and Soviet Union proxy’s during the Cold War, with America spending a reported billion dollars on weapons for Sudanese allies.

Now, the people of Sudan are still suffering because of all this – while the West tries to look the other way.

Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse

Featured image via DW News – YouTube