UNHCR appeals for $1billion for Sudanese refugees, returnees

August 29, 2023 (JUBA) – The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Filippo Grandi has made an appeal for $1billion to cater for the humanitarian needs of refugees and returnees fleeing the conflict in Sudan.

Addressing journalists at a press conference in Juba on Tuesday, Grandi said with the high influx of people from Sudan to South Sudan, UNHCR had exhausted all the resources it had earlier mobilized.

“We are operating in a context of a humanitarian appeal that we issued at the beginning of the crisis, just after the Sudanese refugees started moving out of Sudan in April,” explained Grandi.

“We appealed for half a billion dollars not just for South Sudan but for Countries that are receiving the Sudanese refugees. That appeal was valid until September and we have received half of that amount but that has come to an end,” he added.

Of the $1billion, South Sudan will receive $356 million while the rest can go to other countries such as Chad and Egypt, which are also receiving Sudanese refugees.

“This funding is not only for South Sudan but other countries that are receiving Sudanese refugees. In that one billion dollars, the amount that we are appealing for South Sudan is $356 million,” stressed Grandi

To UN official said the funds needed would be mobilized from international donors, well-wishers, and governments in those countries hosting the refugees.

South Sudan, according to Grandi, has so far received about 400,000 people, the majority of them being South Sudanese returnees from neighbouring Sudan.

For his part, South Sudan’s Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management minister, Albino Akol Atak said cabinet has released more than $5 million to support humanitarian operations for refugees and returnees from Sudan.

“The money which was approved by the cabinet has covered humanitarian operations, especially the receiving and transporting refugees and returnees from entry points at Joda in Upper Nile and in another area in Unity, Warrap, Northern and Western Bahr el Ghazal states”, he told reporters on Tuesday.

More than 4.5 million people have been displaced inside and outside Sudan due to the conflict that erupted on 15 April between the Sudanese army (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (SAF), according to the UN and other aid agencies.

(ST)