World Food Programme airlifts aid to Sudan’s Darfur from Ethiopia

ROME, July 1 (AFP) — The United Nation’s World Food Programme (WFP) on Thursday began airlifting food aid to Sudan’s western Darfur region from the Ethiopian capital, the WFP announced from its Rome headquarters.

Two WFP-chartered Ilyushin cargo planes will make 44 trips to Nyala in south Darfur and El Fasher in north Darfur to carry 2,000 metric tons of enriched flour — enough to feed some 300,000 people for one month — to the war-torn region, the WFP said in a statement.

“We have launched this airlift to deliver critically needed food aid to Darfur. Without this enriched food, the lives of thousands of children, pregnant and lactating women are at risk due to widespread severe malnutrition in the conflict-ridden region,” said Abnezer Ngowi, WFPs Acting Country Director in Ethiopia.

The airlifts mark an acceleration of WFP food deliveries to Darfur.

The agency estimates that 1.2 million people in Darfur, where rebels have been fighting the Khartoum government and an allied militia group since February last year, will need food aid each month until October.

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan was Thursday due in Darfur, which the United Nations has described as having the worst humanitarian situation in the world.

Annan’s visit was preceded by one by US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who delivered a stern warning to Khartoum to ease the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

At least 10,000 people have been killed and more than one million displaced since fighting broke out in Darfur last year.