Sudan bloodshed may see 1 million flee: UN
- About 350,000 people have fled across Sudan’s borders since war between army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces erupted on April 15
- UN refugee agency said estimates of 1 million fleeing by October ‘may be conservative’; crisis has ‘potential to destabilise entire region and beyond’
Estimates that about a million people might flee Sudan by October may be conservative and conflict there risks increasing human trafficking and spreading weapons across a fragile region, the head of the UN refugee agency said on Monday.
More than 350,000 people have already fled across Sudan’s borders since war between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) erupted on April 15, with most heading to Egypt, Chad and South Sudan.
More than 1 million have been displaced within Sudan, which has a population of 49 million and where heavy fighting has torn through residential areas of the capital Khartoum and violence has also flared in the western region of Darfur.
UNHCR had foreseen about 800,000 Sudanese and 200,000 people of other nationalities leaving Sudan over six months, the refugee agency’s head Filippo Grandi said in an interview in Cairo after a visit to the border with Sudan.
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“This projection, that in the next few months we’ll reach these high figures, may even be conservative,” he said. “At the beginning I didn’t believe it would be, but now I’m beginning to be worried.”
The nations bordering Sudan include South Sudan, Central African Republic, Ethiopia, and Libya, all affected by their own recent conflicts.
