AFRICA/SUDAN - Humanitarian aid denied in conflict areas: MSF forced to close activities

Friday, 30 January 2015

Brussels (Agenzia Fides) - Because access to people trapped in conflict areas has been systematically denied by the authorities in Sudan, the Brussels-based operational centre of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) announces that it can no longer reach communities in the greatest need, and therefore has been forced to close its activities in the country.
The Brussels-based section of MSF was focusing on three conflict-affected parts of Sudan, where hundreds of thousands of people are displaced and in need of assistance. But total denial of access to Blue Nile State, forced closure of activities in East Darfur State, and administrative obstacles and blockages in South Darfur State have made it impossible for MSF to respond to medical emergencies in these areas.
MSF has been consistently denied access to Blue Nile State, where conflict erupted in autumn 2011 between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army–North (SPLA-N) group. Death rates in the camps reached more than double the recognized emergency mortality thresholds since the conflict started and this Sudanese State has become a restricted zone, with no international aid workers allowed in.
In El Sereif camp for displaced people near Nyala, the capital of South Darfur, the MSF team was blocked from providing urgently needed additional emergency capacity. MSF was running a medical project in the camp, but when a new influx of displaced people arrived fleeing violence in March and April 2014, an urgently needed reinforcement team of emergency specialists was denied travel permits to the camp. The needs related to violence and displacement clearly extend to other areas of Sudan. The year-end UN statistics show around 400,000 people newly displaced in the wider Darfur region in 2014, a total of 2.3 million people displaced throughout the country, and 6.9 million people in need of humanitarian assistance.
Other sections of MSF continue to work in Sudan, although the Paris-based section of MSF has suspended activities in South Kordofan State until further notice following the targeted bombing of its hospital in Frandala on 20 January 2015. (AP) (Agenzia Fides 30/01/2015)


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