Key facts on the Sudan humanitarian situation

July 31, 2004 (AP) — Facts on the Sudan humanitarian situation, according to United Nations agencies:

– About 1.1 million people in Darfur have been forced from their homes and fled to other parts of the region. Another 150,000-200,000 people from Darfur have fled into neighboring Chad, according to the Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The population of the three-state region before the conflict was 6 million.

– The 17-month-long conflict has led to 30,000 deaths in the region, U.S. Ambassador John C. Danforth has said.

– Half a million children are among those forced to flee their homes, according to the U.N. Children’s Fund.

– Lack of protection from violence is the greatest threat to the population driven from their homes, OCHA says.

– Aid workers have been unable to reach 29 of the 137 settlements for internally displaced people because of bad weather, poor infrastructure, insecurity or other reasons.

– U.N. agencies have made a consolidated appeal for $349.5 million for Darfur and the refugees in Chad through December, but contributions to date cover only 45 percent of that, or $158.4 million.

– Rains are making the terrain very difficult to navigate and forcing agencies to rely more on aircraft to deliver supplies, a far more costly means of delivery. The World Food Program anticipates an air-supply effort exceeding the Berlin airlift of the late 1940s.

– WFP efforts to supply food to about 1 million people in July have reached about 80 percent of that population.

– U.N. agencies are working to develop accurate malnutrition and mortality rates, which are believed to be high, according to OCHA.

– UNICEF, the World Health Organization and Sudan’s Ministry of Health have conducted a measles vaccination program that has reached 2 million of the 2.6 million children targeted in the Darfur region .