Famine Declared: Sudan’s City of Death:
The worst fears have been confirmed. War-torn Sudan is no longer facing just a hunger crisis—it is grappling with an officially declared famine.
The crisis today is the result of a civil war that erupted on April 15th, 2023, between two former allies: the regular Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The core reason? A brutal power struggle over the country’s military and political future.
The RSF, which evolved from the infamous Janjaweed militias, quickly focused its fight on the Darfur region.
In a devastating new assessment, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification has confirmed famine conditions in two critical areas: the Darfur city of El Fasher and Kadugli in South Kordofan. This marks the second time famine has been confirmed in Sudan in less than a year.
The declaration comes in the immediate aftermath of the RSF seizing full control of El Fasher, the last stronghold of the rival Sudanese military in Darfur.
The humanitarian fallout is catastrophic.
The United Nations reports that nearly seventy-one thousand people have fled El Fasher and surrounding areas in a desperate dash for safety since the RSF takeover. They are walking for days, arriving in nearby camps like Tawila—which is already critically overcrowded—exhausted, malnourished, and terrified.
Survivors report systematic atrocities—including mass executions, sexual violence, and targeted ethnic cleansing—as the RSF consolidates power across Darfur, mirroring the dark patterns of the region’s past.
Aid workers warn that food, medicine, and relief supplies are systematically blocked. El Fasher and Kadugli are under siege, with trapped families reportedly surviving on nothing but leaves, animal feed, and grass.
The latest figures reveal that a staggering 21 million people across Sudan are now facing critical levels of acute hunger. But more terrifyingly, at least three hundred and seventy-five thousand people are pushed into Phase 5 famine conditions**—meaning they are facing starvation and imminent death.
International bodies are pleading for immediate, robust action to ensure humanitarian access and to stop the flow of weapons.
As Sudan faces what the UN describes as one of the worst humanitarian crises of the 21st century, the question is no longer if the world will act, but when before this silent famine becomes a total collapse.
