The world’s patience with Sudan’s war is wearing thin. A fresh joint statement puts the Sudan famine risk squarely on the global agenda, and its message is blunt: the hunger crisis needs action now.
A united warning
The statement, released by the US State Department on Monday, carries the names of about 31 countries, including the US, the UK, France, Germany and Australia, plus the European Commissioner for crisis management. It describes an alarming deterioration in food security and cites the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification’s warning of famine in the coming months. Nearly 20 million people are struggling to get enough food, according to IANS reporting on the statement.
What the signatories want
The demands are practical. Warring parties should authorise aid through all crossline and cross-border routes, including air access into Darfur. They should keep humanitarian workers present and protected, and stop striking civilian infrastructure. The countries also urged the international community to scale up funding, and asked financial institutions to adapt their existing programmes to the food crisis. The parties to the conflict, the statement stresses, carry primary responsibility for ending the suffering.
A war with no end in sight
Sudan’s army and the Rapid Support Forces have fought since April 2023, after falling out over how to merge their forces during a planned shift to civilian rule. More than 14 million people have been displaced. In July, a UN probe concluded that RSF forces carried out mass killings, rapes and forced starvation in a city they besieged and captured last year, amounting to genocide. Last month, Washington said neither side represents legitimate, constitutional governance.
For Africans watching from Lagos, Nairobi or Accra, this is not distant news. Sudan’s neighbours absorb the refugees, and soaring food prices inside the country keep deepening the crisis. Statements alone do not feed anyone. The test now is whether the money and the access follow.
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