GENEVA: Sudan is facing the abyss and potentially hundreds of thousands of deaths unless the devastating war in the country ends and aid pours in, the United Nations warned Thursday.
UN human rights chief Volker Turk painted a bleak outlook for Sudan, where famine has already taken hold and millions have fled their homes amid intense fighting between rival forces.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been locked in a brutal conflict between army chief Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan and his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, who leads the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).
“Sudan is a powder keg, on the verge of a further explosion into chaos, and at increasing risk of atrocity crimes and mass deaths from famine,” Turk warned the UN Human Rights Council.
He called the country “the world’s largest humanitarian catastrophe.”
“We are looking into the abyss. Humanitarian agencies warn that without action to end the war, deliver emergency aid, and get agriculture back on its feet, hundreds of thousands of people could die.”
Turk said more than 600,000 people were “on the brink of starvation,” with famine reported to have taken hold in five areas, including the Zamzam displacement camp in North Darfur.
Turk said five more areas could face famine in the next three months, while a further 17 are considered at risk.
He said an estimated 8.8 million people had been forced from their homes within Sudan, while 3.5 million more have fled across borders.
“This is the biggest displacement crisis in the world,” he said.
“Some 30.4 million people need assistance, from health care to food and other forms of humanitarian support,” he said.
Presenting his annual report on the human rights situation in Sudan, Turk said some of the acts it documented may constitute war crimes and other atrocity crimes.
Turk said the Sudanese people had endured “unfathomable suffering and pain” since the conflict began, “with no peaceful solution in sight.”
Responding to the report, Sudanese justice minister Muawiya Osman blamed the RSF for starting the war and accused them of having “forced people out of their regions, humiliating them, and trying to cleanse specific regions from their original populations, just like West Darfur.”
He accused the RSF of “blocking humanitarian deliveries” and said the government was committed to “just peace and stability across the country, to address the needs of the Sudanese people, maintain their dignity and end the suffering.”
However, Adama Dieng, the African Union’s special envoy on the prevention of genocide and other mass atrocities, said extreme violence against civilians — by both sides in the conflict — was widespread.
“The war has been characterised by targeting of civilians, including executions, abduction, torture, sexual violence, slavery and sexual slavery, looting of private property, indiscriminate bombardment,” Dieng told the Human Rights Council in a video statement.
“Sexual assault has reached such proportions that there have been reports of women committing mass suicide as the only way to avoid rape.”
Ghana, speaking for the African group, called for a “single, coordinated international effort” to resolve the crisis, but said the “utmost priority is to silence the guns,” paving the way for uninterrupted aid flows.
France said both parties were refusing to respect the fundamental rules of international humanitarian and human rights law.
Britain said the conflict was “wholly unnecessary” and said the perpetrators of abuses needed to be brought to account.