UNITED NATIONS: The US ambassador to the United Nations announced nearly $203 million in additional humanitarian assistance to Sudan on Thursday but warned that the money is not a “panacea” and urged other countries to fulfill their financial pledges to address what she called “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.”
World leaders pledged more than $2.1 billion in humanitarian aid for Sudan at a donors conference in Paris in April, but US envoy Linda Thomas-Greenfield said only about a quarter of the promised funds have been received three months later.
The northeastern African country descended into chaos in April 2023 when simmering tensions between the country’s military and a notorious paramilitary group, the Rapid Support Forces, exploded into open fighting in the capital of Khartoum.
The devastating conflict has spread, especially to western Darfur, and has killed more than 14,000 people and wounded 33,000 others, according to the United Nations. It has also created the world’s largest displacement crisis, with more than 11 million people forced to flee their homes.
Thomas-Greenfield said Thursday’s contribution raises total US humanitarian assistance to Sudan to $1.6 billion since September 2023, making the United States Sudan’s largest single donor.
“We hope this new round of aid serves as a call to action for others to follow,” she said.
The ambassador said the additional $203 million will go toward food supplies, shelters, schools and health services, as well as cash assistance to refugees to help pay their rents. The funds also will help neighboring countries, where over 2 million Sudanese refugees have fled, she said.
The US mission to the UN said Thomas-Greenfield briefed UN diplomats on the hunger crisis in Sudan, where a record 25 million people face acute food insecurity and 755,000 people face famine in the coming months, according toa recent report by the UN global network monitoring the threat of famine.
Human rights experts working for the United Nations said both sides have used food and starvation as a weapon of war.
Thomas-Greenfield recalled her visit to a hospital in Chad run by the medical charity Doctors Without Borders: “Children were so weak they lacked the energy to even cry.”
Global humanitarian aid organization Mercy Corps recently estimated that nine in 10 children suffer from life-threatening malnutrition in central Darfur, where the World Food Program has delivered aid in recent months after facing challenges negotiating access with armed groups.
Thomas-Greenfield said the US will continue diplomatic efforts to hold perpetrators of the violence accountable and reach a peace agreement between the warring parties.
Last week, representatives of the two sides arrived in Geneva for separate talks with the UN secretary-general’s personal envoy, Ramtane Lamamra, about protecting civilians through possible local ceasefires.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said late Thursday that Lamamra and his team have continued engaging separately with each of the delegations throughout this week on humanitarian assistance and protection of civilians. He said the talks are expected to conclude Friday.
They marked the second attempt at deescalation after talks in Saudi Arabia’s port city of Jeddah broke down at the end of last year.
US announces $203 million in new aid to war-torn Sudan amid major humanitarian crisis
https://arab.news/6jg8g
US announces $203 million in new aid to war-torn Sudan amid major humanitarian crisis
- US envoy Linda Thomas-Greenfield urges other countries to fulfill their financial pledges to address “the world’s worst humanitarian crisis”
- More than 11 million people had been forced to flee their homes since the war between two warlords plunged Sudan into chaos in April 2023
US lawmakers press Israel to probe strike on reporters in Lebanon
- “The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said
- Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured
WASHINGTON: Several Democratic lawmakers called Thursday for the Israeli and US governments to fully investigate a deadly 2023 attack by the Israeli military on journalists in southern Lebanon.
The October 13, 2023 airstrike killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and wounded six other reporters, including two from AFP — video journalist Dylan Collins and photographer Christina Assi, who lost her leg.
“We expect the Israeli government to conduct an investigation that meets the international standards and to hold accountable those people who did this,” Senator Peter Welch told a news conference, with Collins by his side.
The lawmaker from Collins’s home state of Vermont said he had been pushing for answers for two years, first from the administration of Democratic president Joe Biden and now from the Republican White House of Donald Trump.
The Israeli government has “stonewalled at every single turn,” Welch added.
“With the Israeli government, we have been extremely patient, and we have done everything we reasonably can to obtain answers and accountability,” he said.
“The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said, referring to the Israeli military, adding that it has told his office its investigation into the incident is closed.
Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured.
“But I’d also like them to put pressure on their greatest ally in the Middle East, the Israeli government, to bring the perpetrators to account,” he said, echoing the lawmakers who called the attack a “war crime.”
“We’re not letting it go,” Vermont congresswoman Becca Balint said. “It doesn’t matter how long they stonewall us.”
AFP conducted an independent investigation which concluded that two Israeli 120mm tank shells were fired from the Jordeikh area in Israel.
The findings were corroborated by other international probes, including investigations conducted by Reuters, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders.
Unlike Welch’s assertion Thursday that the Israeli probe was over, the IDF told AFP in October that “findings regarding the event have not yet been concluded.”
