WFP misses target of 1.2 million people in Sudan’s Darfur region

NAIROBI, Sept 7 (AFP) — The UN World Food Programme (WFP) failed to deliver relief supplies to its target of 1.2 million people in western Sudan’s Darfur region in August, but was “starting to meet huge challenges”, WFP said Tuesday.

The agency fed nearly a million people in war-ravaged Darfur last month, but “this fell alarmingly short of its target of 1.2 million people,” the agency said in a statement sent to AFP in Nairobi.

“Considering the severe constraints we faced in August and continue to face this month, reaching nearly a million people in August does indicate that we are starting to meet the huge challenges in Darfur,” WFP director for Sudan, Ramiro Lopes da Silva, said in the statement.

“But we won’t feel at all comfortable until we have the capacity to reach every last person, who is in need of our assistance in Darfur,” Silva added.

“The number of people that remain to be reached is worryingly high and we simply have to do better in September,” he added.

WFP attributed its failure to reach its target last month on heavy rains and insecurity in Darfur.

“August was the height of the rainy season in Darfur and large swathes of decrepit roads were rendered impassable, as trucks laden with food struggled to reach Darfur on the long drive from Port Sudan on the Red Sea.

“Bad weather forced some air drops of food to be postponed in West Darfur, the state worst hit by the rains, while downpours frequently made the state’s dirt runway at El-Geneina unusable by WFP transport aircraft carrying food to avoid dependence on land routes,” the statement said.

“Insecurity substantially cut the number of people who could be reached, while clashes between government forces and Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) rebels were more frequent than in recent months, closing areas accessible by UN aid agencies,” it said.

The UN estimates that up to 50,000 people have been killed in Darfur since minority tribal rebels rose up in February 2003 against the government in Khartoum, which responded with attacks carried out by a proxy militia on tribes backing the rebellion.

Another 1.2 million people are displaced in Darfur itself, while up to 200,000 more have been settled in makeshift camps in equally impoverished eastern Chad, according to the United Nations.