The Sudanese conflict that's left 25 million people without food

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People fleeing the town of Singa, the capital of Sudan's southeastern Sennar state, rest in a makeshift camp after arriving in Gedaref in the east of the war-torn country on July 2, 2024. Photograph: AFP via Getty Images

Since civil war broke out in Sudan 15 months ago, thousands have been killed in the fighting. Sudanese people are now facing horror “beyond imagination” with more than 750,000 on the brink of starvation, a senior UN official warned in late June.

In a tweet posted on June 27th, outgoing UN aid chief Martin Griffiths wrote that over 25 million people faced “high levels of acute hunger, including 755,000 in catastrophic conditions”. “This could have been avoided,” wrote the British diplomat.

Aid experts have warned for months that Sudan was hurtling towards a humanitarian disaster – Irish-born Samantha Power, head of USAID, described it as “the single largest humanitarian crisis on the planet”.

Meanwhile, ten million people have been forcibly displaced by the country’s civil war which has raged across the country since April 2023.

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Today, on In the News, how war in Sudan has brought the country to the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe.

Irish Times reporter in Africa Sally Hayden discusses the devastating situation facing the people of Sudan and the potential solutions for ending this crisis.

Presented by Sorcha Pollak.

Produced by Declan Conlon.

Sorcha Pollak

Sorcha Pollak

Sorcha Pollak is an Irish Times reporter and cohost of the In the News podcast