New York - Khartoum: Europe and the Arabs
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees - in cooperation with 64 humanitarian and national civil society organizations - launched an appeal for $1 billion to provide basic assistance and protection to neighboring countries to people fleeing violence in Sudan, who are expected to reach more than 1.8 million people by End of year. According to the daily UN news bulletin, of which we received a copy on Wednesday morning
The Commission said yesterday that this amount represents double what was estimated to respond to the crisis in May, while displacement and needs are worsening, as more than one million people have fled the country so far.
Mamadou Diagne Balde, the regional refugee coordinator for the situation in Sudan, said that the crisis has increased urgent needs for humanitarian aid, “as those arriving in remote border areas find themselves in dire conditions due to inadequate services and weak infrastructure.”
He stressed that UNHCR's partners are doing everything they can to support arrivals and host communities, "but without adequate resources from donors, these efforts will be significantly undermined."
The UNHCR expressed concern about the deteriorating health situation, especially among new arrivals, as high rates of malnutrition, outbreaks of diseases such as cholera and measles and related deaths were recorded in many host countries.
In this context, Baldi said: "It is very sad that we are receiving reports of children dying from diseases that are entirely preventable, if the partners had sufficient resources. Action can no longer be postponed."
The neighboring countries receiving those fleeing Sudan are the Central African Republic, Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia and South Sudan, which were hosting hundreds of thousands of refugees even before this crisis.
The regional director said that countries in the region face significant challenges of their own, “yet they continue to show remarkable generosity, but we cannot take their hospitality for granted.”
He called on the international community to stand in solidarity with governments and host communities and address the ongoing shortfall in funding for humanitarian operations.
This is the third amendment of its kind to the Sudan Regional Emergency Refugee Response Plan for 2023 - which was launched in May, which shows the scale of the humanitarian crisis resulting from the continued movement of displacement out of Sudan. The UNHCR said that the resources provided by donors have not kept pace with the increasing volume of needs, as only 20 percent of the total increasing needs have been obtained so far.