Internally displaced people in Sudan surpass 10m, says UN agency

The number of internally displaced people in Sudan has reached more than 10 million, the UN migration agency said on Monday.

The International Organization for Migration said the tally includes 2.83 million driven from their homes before the current war began by multiple local conflicts that have been happening in recent years.

More than 2 million other people have been driven abroad, mostly to neighboring Chad, South Sudan and Egypt, an IOM spokesman said.

Sudan’s conflict began in April last year when soaring tensions between the leaders of the military and the powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces exploded into open fighting in the capital, Khartoum and elsewhere in the country.

“Imagine a city the size of London being displaced. That’s what it’s like, but it’s happening with the constant threat of crossfire, with famine, disease and brutal ethnic and gender-based violence,” said IOM Director-General Amy Pope in a statement.

The UN food agency warned the warring parties last month that there is a serious risk of widespread starvation and death in the western region of Darfur and elsewhere in Sudan if they don’t allow humanitarian aid into the vast western region.

Pope called for a unified response from the international community to avoid “a looming famine” in Sudan, where humanitarian needs are ”massive, acute and immediate.” She said less than one fifth of the funds IOM has sought for the response have been delivered.

The war has wrecked Sudan, killing more than 14,000 people and wounding thousands others, while pushing its population to the brink of famine.

Together, the number of refugees and internally displaced means that more than a quarter of Sudan’s population of 47 million have been driven from their homes.

Meanwhile, the Rapid Support Forces fired shots and looted a main hospital in the western region of Darfur, forcing its closure, an international aid group said.

The group attacked the South Hospital in Al-Fasher, the capital city of North Darfur province on Sunday, opening fire on medical staff and patients, Doctors Without Borders said in a statement.

“It is outrageous that the RSF opened fire inside the hospital. This is not an isolated incident, as staff and patients have endured attacks on the facility for weeks from all sides, but opening fire inside a hospital crosses a line,” said Michel Lacharite, head of emergency operations at Doctors Without Borders.

At the time of the attack, there were 10 patients and a reduced medical crew as the aid group and the Sudanese Health Ministry had begun evacuating patients and transferring medical services last week to other facilities, the aid group said.