MSF Spain flees rebel attacks in Sudan’s Darfur region

MADRID, Nov 7 (AFP) — The Spanish branch of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders, MSF) confirmed on Sunday it had withdrawn its staff from the Jebel Marra area in Sudan’s Darfur region due to fighting between government forces and rebels.

The branch’s director of communications, Jordi Passola, reached by telephone in Barcelona, said the six-member team had been evacuated from the Golo area in Jebel Marra “by its own means.”

It had flown to safety in Al-Fashir in North Darfur.

He said the evacuation was “preventative and temporary.”

The agency thus confirmed an earlier report from the Sudanese Media Center, which reported earlier on Sunday that the branch, along with the Dublin-based GOAL agency, had flown out.

The action was taken after “repeated” acts of aggression
targeting the humanitarian personnel and the relief supplies
intended for people in need, the press service said. The NGOs also complained that the rebels attacked their vehicles, it added.

Fighting erupted in Darfur in February last year after the
rebels launched an armed insurrection to protest what they allege is the political and economic marginalisation of the region’s black Africans by the Arab-led government.

Khartoum’s response was to unleash a brutal Arab militia, the Janjaweed. Since the fighting began more than 70,000 people have been killed or have died from hunger and disease in the area’s huge refugee camps, according to the UN.