Darfur gunmen steal 20 trucks from WFP

7 Feb, 2006 (GENEVA) — Gunmen have stolen 20 trucks carrying aid in Sudan’s troubled Darfur region, the World Food Programme said on Tuesday.

Christiane Berthiaume, spokeswoman for the UN agency, said the attacks on several convoys took place in recent weeks in zones controlled by Darfur’s rebels.

“The roads are dangerous. Every day, trucks get attacked, their cargoes are stolen and their drivers are kidnapped,” Berthiaume told journalists.

Security problems are putting the WFP’s operations in Darfur at risk, she added.

Some 2.7 million people in the region rely on food aid from the WFP, and the agency is finding it increasingly difficult to recruit drivers because of the violence.

That is raising fears that it will be unable to deliver enough supplies before the rainy season starts in April, turning the region’s roads into a quagmire, Berthiaume said.

Despite pressing Sudan’s governments and Darfur’s rebels, the WFP has received no guarantees that its convoys will be safe, she said.

Last week, gunmen in Darfur reportedly kidnapped eight workers — most of them believed to be Sudanese — with the French humanitarian group Action Contre La Faim.

Sudanese authorities blamed the abduction on the rebels.

The Darfur conflict broke out in February 2003.

It pits rebel groups who are campaigning for a greater share of the power and wealth of Sudan against the Khartoum government and its affiliated militias.

Fighting and the humanitarian crisis in the region has claimed between 180,000 and 300,000 lives, and displaced more than two million people.

(ST/AFP)