Geneva/Khartoum (EFE). – At least 191 people have been killed, dozens of local communities have been “burnt and destroyed” and thousands have fled in Geneina, the capital of the West Darfur region and one of the main hotbeds of the ongoing conflict in Sudan.
This was denounced today by the NGO Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), an organization based in Geneva, one of whose volunteers on the ground has been killed, and its local headquarters, where there were reception facilities, looted.
Violence in West Darfur broke out on April 25, some 10 days after Khartoum and other Sudanese cities, with clashes between various armed groups in many cases in urban areas in central Geneina.
The Sudanese Army, which has been in conflict since April 15 in various parts of the country with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (FAR), had warned that the situation in this region is “complicated”, having led to “tribal conflicts”. .
West Darfur, the scene of an ethnic conflict between 2003 and 2008 that claimed the lives of 300,000 people, is one of the FAR’s strongholds, since many of its fighters are from that area.
Humanitarian aid
The humanitarian chief and UN emergency aid coordinator, Martin Griffiths, arrived this Wednesday in the Sudanese port city of Port Sudan (west) to ensure the commitment of the United Nations to help the Sudanese people, after the outbreak of the conflict on past April 15.
Griffiths is the first senior UN official to visit the African country since the start of the fighting, which has created a situation described as “catastrophic” by international and local organizations.
International and local organizations have repeatedly warned about the “tragic” humanitarian situation in the country, as well as an imminent collapse of the health system, where the vast majority of hospitals and clinics are already out of service due to ongoing fighting.
The exact number of military and civilian victims of the clashes is unknown, which have not ceased despite consecutive 72-hour truces, the last of which ends today
However, the Sudanese Ministry of Health claims that at least 550 civilians have been killed and nearly 5,000 injured since the conflict broke out.