300,000 Sudanese flee homes after notorious group seizes their safe haven

CAIRO (AP):

Fighting between Sudan’s military and a notorious paramilitary group forced up to 300,000 people to flee their homes in a province that had been a safe haven for families displaced by the devastating conflict in the northeastern African country, the UN said Thursday.

The fighting erupted in the city of Wad Medani, the provincial capital of Jazeera province, after the Rapid Support Forces attacked the city earlier this month. The RSF said that it took over Wad Medani earlier this week, and the military said that its troops withdrew from the city, and an investigation was opened.

Sudan’s war began in mid-April after months of tensions between military chief General Abdel-Fattah Burhan and RSF commander General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo. Both generals led a military coup in October 2021 that derailed Sudan’s short-lived transition to democracy following a popular uprising that forced the removal of President Omar al-Bashir in April 2019.

The UN agency International Organization for Migration said that between 250,000 and 300,000 people fled the province — many reportedly on foot — to safer areas in the provinces of al-Qadarif, Sinnar and the White Nile. Some sheltered in camps for displaced people and many sought shelter in local communities, it said.

Jazeera, Sudan’s breadbasket, was home to about six million Sudanese. Since the war, about 500,000 displaced fled to the province, mostly from the capital, Khartoum, which has been the centre of fighting, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Medani, which is about 100 kilometres (60 miles) southeast of Khartoum, had hosted more than 86,000 of the displaced, OCHA said.

The World Food Program announced Wednesday that it has temporarily halted food assistance in some parts of Jazeera, in what it described a “major setback” to humanitarian efforts in the province.

The UN food agency said that it had provided assistance to 800,000 people in the province, including many families that fled the fighting in Khartoum.

The conflict in Sudan has wrecked the country and killed up to 9,000 people as of October, according to the United Nations. However, activists and doctors’ groups say the real toll is far higher.