UN appeals for unhindered access to aid delivery in Sudan

March 15, 2024 (KHARTOUM) – There were enough aid stocks in Port Sudan, but getting the aid from there to the people in need remains a problem, a United Nations official said.

Jill Lawler, the emergency chief in Sudan for the UN children’s agency UNICEF, said she led the first UN mission to reach Khartoum since war erupted in April 2023.

She told reporters via video link that the delegation witnessed firsthand that “the scale and magnitude of needs for children across the country are simply staggering”.

The team visited several hospitals, where doctors spoke of growing needs. Patients shared beds, and many staff members lived in hospitals without salaries for months.

“Some hospitals were operating in complete darkness as there were power outages,” said Lawler, adding “UNICEF mission had also learned of cases of women and girls who had been raped in the first months of the war now delivering babies.”

The UNICEF official further spoke of seeing many young people carrying arms.

Hunger was pervasive and was the number one concern people had expressed.

Lawler said while food was available, it was expensive for many people to afford.

The numbers of acutely malnourished children were rising, and the lean season had not yet begun, with UNICEF projecting that nearly 3.7 million children were acutely malnourished this year, including 730,000 in need of lifesaving treatment.

Lawler further said that Sudan was now the world’s largest displacement crisis.

She, however, appealed to the parties to the conflict in Sudan to provide unimpeded, immediate, safe humanitarian access to people in need.

“Parties to the conflict had both moral imperative and legal obligation to protect children; killing and maiming of children, as well as their recruitment and sexual violence against children, were all strictly prohibited,” stressed Lawler.

“Sudan was being pushed towards a famine, with a potential catastrophic loss of lives. Twenty-four million children across Sudan needed and deserved peace. They needed a ceasefire. They needed a lasting political solution,” she concluded.

Alessandra Vellucci, the Director of the UN Information Service in Geneva, said Sudan’s 2024 Humanitarian Response Plan of 2.7 billion was five per cent funded.

She reiterated the Secretary-General’s call for a ceasefire during Ramadan.

(ST)