The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has warned of a “generational catastrophe” for the country's 24 million children due to the nine-month-old civil war in Sudan. The conflict is endangering the health and well-being of children, UNICEF representative in Sudan, Mandeep O'Brien, told the AFP news agency. According to a group of pro-democracy lawyers, at least 33 civilians were killed in fighting last night.
According to O'Brien, about half of the more than seven million people displaced by war are children. Sudan faces “the biggest displacement crisis in the world,” he said. The country needs peace, demanded the UNICEF representative. “Without urgent action, almost 20 million children in Sudan will be out of school this year,” he warned. The country's future is at stake. 14 million children are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.
Bloody struggle for power
In the northeast African country, troops of military ruler Abdel Fattah al-Burhan have been involved in a bloody power struggle against the RSF militia of his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, since mid-April. It is estimated that more than 12,000 people were killed.
On Thursday, 23 civilians were killed in airstrikes in Khartoum's Soba district, the Emergency Lawyers group reported. The army still has air sovereignty in Sudan. Ten civilians were also killed by artillery fire in residential areas and the local market, the group said.
The focus of the war recently shifted from Khartoum in the south to the Al-Jazeera state, where hundreds of thousands of people had already fled the fighting. Daglo's RSF controls the capital Khartoum and much of western Darfur.