North Darfur siege leaves children blinded, families shattered by violence

 



Faces marked by terror and torment fill North Darfur’s displacement camps.

Their eyes fill with despair as they describe what they have survived during a 16-month siege on one of Sudan‘s oldest cities.

It has entrapped their loved ones and spread armed violence, leaving village after village burnt to the ground.

Extreme cases of torture, rape, and forced starvation are shared again and again in horrifying detail.

Women collapse into sobs as they contemplate the future, and the elderly raise their hands to the sky, trembling and empty, to pray for overdue relief.

In shelters that have seen little to no humanitarian aid, camp directors hand us lists showing requests for clean water, medical supplies, and food. Even the trademark white United Nations tarp is scarce.

Some frayed tent material is used to close the gaps in the stick-lined walls that surround the traditional huts displaced families have built for themselves.

They use them as a temporary refuge from the battles that rage for control of the regional capital, Al Fashir.

Instead of fleeing into nearby Chad, they wait here for news that the siege has been lifted and they may finally be able to return.

But that news may never come.

The battle for Al Fashir – and Sudan

Al Fashir is being suffocated to death by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) as they push to claim full control of the Darfur region as a base for their parallel government, after the military recaptured the capital Khartoum and other key sites in central Sudan.

Close to a million people are facing famine in Al Fashir and surrounding camps as the RSF enforces a full blockade, launching armed attacks on volunteers and aid workers risking their lives to bring in food.

Inside the city, thousands are bombarded by almost daily shelling from surrounding RSF troops.

The RSF has physically reinforced their siege with a berm – a raised earth mound. First spotted by Yale Humanitarian Research Lab, the berm is visible from space.

The Sudan war started in April 2023, when long-simmering tensions between the Sudanese army and the RSF broke out in Khartoum.

UN agencies said in July that some 40,000 people have been killed and almost 13 million displaced. Several mediation attempts have failed to secure a humanitarian access mechanism or any lulls in fighting.

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