Sudan enters 4th year of war as ‘abandoned crisis’ grows

Famine. Massacres. And now badly needed food and other supplies are under strain. Sudan on Wednesday enters a fourth year of war that is being called an “abandoned crisis” as a new conflict in the Middle East throws into shadow the fighting that has forced 13 million people to flee their homes.Sudan has been described as the world’s largest humanitarian challenge, notably in terms of displacement and hunger. There is no end in sight to the fighting between the military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces that witnesses and aid groups say has laid waste to parts of the vast Darfur region.Growing evidence shows regional powers like the United Arab Emirates backing combatants behind the scenes. Attempts by the United States and regional powers, now distracted by the Iran war, have failed to establish a ceasefire.“This grim and chastening anniversary marks another year when the world has failed to meet the test of Sudan,” United Nations humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher said.A petrol attendant fills a car’s tank at a petrol station amid a fuel crisis and soaring petrol prices in Omdurman, north of Sudan’s capital Khartoum, on Sunday. Photo: AFPNumbers tell a tale of painAt least 59,000 people have been killed. At least 6,000 died over three days as the RSF rampaged through the Darfur outpost of el-Fasher in October, according to the UN, with UN-backed experts concluding the offensive bore “the defining characteristics of genocide”. More than 11,000 people were missing over the course of the war, the Red Cross says.