“Thousands of children have been killed or injured in the war in Sudan. Sexual violence and recruitment are on the rise. And the situation is even more serious where humanitarian presence continues to be denied”. This was stated by James Elder, spokesperson for UNICEF, underlining that “five million children have been forced to flee their homes – a shocking average of 10,000 girls and boys displaced every day – making Sudan the largest child displacement crisis in the world. Many of them have had to do so multiple times.”

“On Saturday morning,” Elder continued, “a local boys’ soccer team was playing in a UNICEF child-friendly space in Khartoum State when a shell hit the soccer field. Two boys were killed and nearly the entire team was injured. I have met these children, both in the hospital and in the UNICEF child-friendly space. They are shocked,” the spokesperson said. “Yesterday I spoke to a senior health worker who told me about the scale of sexual violence during this war. She explained that she has had direct contact with hundreds of women and girls, some as young as 8, who have been raped. Many have been held captive for weeks on end. She also spoke of the distressing number of children, born after rape, who are abandoned.”

“For more than a year we have been saying that the children of Sudan cannot wait. Well, now they are dying,” Elder added, noting that “the famine in Zamzam camp is the first famine assessment by the Famine Review Committee in more than seven years and only the third time a famine assessment has been made since the monitoring system was established 20 years ago.”

“We must be very clear: without safe and unobstructed access, and without the removal of obstacles – particularly cross-border and on-site ones – this month’s famine assessment in part of Sudan risks spreading and leading to a catastrophic loss of life,” the UNICEF spokesperson continued, warning. “Without action, tens of thousands of Sudanese children could die in the coming months. Tens of thousands. And this is by no means the worst-case scenario. Any illness outbreak will send mortality skyrocketing. Disease is our great fear. If an outbreak of measles, diarrhoea or respiratory infections occurs – and remember that in current living conditions, and with heavy rains and floods, these diseases spread like wildfire – the terrifying prospects for Sudan’s children worsen dramatically.” In addition to calling for “safe and unimpeded humanitarian access through all routes, across conflict lines (particularly Darfur, Khartoum and Kordofan) and across Sudan’s borders,” “a massive increase in donor funding to prevent the collapse of essential systems, paying frontline workers, providing life-saving supplies and maintaining critical infrastructure an immediate ceasefire” is needed. Elder concludes that “by turning a blind eye to Sudan and ignoring the immense suffering, the warring parties and the international community continue to set a dangerous precedent of global apathy towards children.”

See, Sudan: Unicef, “per i bambini è la crisi umanitaria più grande al mondo”

Photo. A Sudanese woman who fled conflict in Darfur, where the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces has been carrying out mass atrocities, crosses to neighbouring Chad on 2 August 2023.Zohra Bensemra. © Reuters