Sudan War: Zamzam Camp Near El-Fasher Is in Famine

Sudan’s civil war has led to famine in a camp housing some 500,000 displaced people near the besieged city of Darfur el-Fasher, an independent group of food security experts said.

The cause was the 16-month conflict and restrictions on the delivery of humanitarian aid, the Famine Review Committee (FRC) concluded after analysing new data.

“The scale of destruction caused by the escalation of violence in el-Fasher is massive and shocking,” the statement said, explaining how the population of Zamzam camp has skyrocketed since April.

The war – a power struggle between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – has created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with 10 million people forced to flee their homes.

US-backed talks due to start in two weeks are apparently in jeopardy.

RSF has accepted an invitation to Geneva, but it is unclear whether the army will go there after Wednesday’s events alleged assassination attempt on military leader Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan.

“The main drivers of hunger in Zamzam camp are conflict and lack of access to humanitarian aid, both of which can be addressed immediately with the necessary political will” The FRC stated,.

The committee, operating under the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) – a global initiative of UN agencies, aid organisations and governments that identifies conditions of hunger – analysed two reports:

Fews Net reports that there is a possibility that famine is also affecting the Abu Shouk and Al Salam camps, located near el-Fasher, but there is not enough evidence to say for sure.

The conditions for an area to be considered famine-affected are as follows: at least 20% of households must suffer from extreme food shortages, 30% of children must be severely malnourished, and two people per 10,000 must die every day from hunger or from malnutrition and disease.

Since April, the RSF has been fighting to take over the city of El-Fasher from the army, the only city in the western Darfur region still under military control.

According to the FRC, an estimated 320,000 people fled the city and an estimated 150,000-200,000 moved to the Zamzam camp “in search of safety, basic services and food” in just a few weeks in May.

That same month, a UN expert on genocide prevention said many civilians in el-Fasher were targeted because of their ethnicity – warning that there was a growing risk of genocide.

The violence in Darfur is reminiscent of the ethnic cleansing unleashed against non-Arab communities by Arab Janjaweed militias two decades ago.

The main market in Zamzam camp was now open only seasonally, and by June prices had risen sharply – by 63% for edible oil, 190% for sugar, 67% for millet and 75% for rice, the FRC said in its 47-page report, giving an insight into conditions in the crowded camp.

There was a famine in June and July, and it is likely to continue until October, the harvest time.

But experts fear the hunger crisis will not ease significantly because the war has prevented many farmers from planting crops.

Barrett Alexander of the aid organization Mercy Corps warned that the dire situation revealed in the reports on el-Fasher, especially in the Zamzam camp, was “just the tip of the iceberg.”

“We know from our experience with previous famines that by the time a famine is officially declared, mass deaths have already occurred.”

He added that a recent assessment conducted by Mercy Corps in Central and South Darfur found that nine out of 10 children suffer from life-threatening malnutrition.

One of the last aid organisations operating in el-Fasher, Doctors Without Borders (MSF), said the situation was likely to worsen if the apparent blockade of humanitarian aid was not urgently lifted.

“Our trucks left N’Djamena in Chad more than six weeks ago and should have reached El-Fasher by now, but we have no idea when they will be released,” said MSF’s Stéphane Doyon, MSF’s head of emergencies in Sudan.

Both sides in the conflict have been accused of blocking and looting humanitarian aid, accusations both deny.

Doctors Without Borders trucks are carrying therapeutic food and medical supplies for children in the Zamzam camp, as well as surgical equipment for the last hospital in el-Fasher where surgical procedures are performed.

A Saudi hospital was hit by gunfire on Monday, killing three workers and wounding at least 25 people, a charity said, in the 10th attack in less than three months.

“We do not know if hospitals are being deliberately attacked, but Monday’s incident shows that the parties to the conflict are not taking any precautions to spare them,” Mr Doyon said.

Additional information provided by Anne Soy of the BBC.