Humanitarian Crisis

As conflict continues to rage across parts of Sudan, including North Darfur State and the Kordofan region, pockets of relative safety have emerged over the past four months — spurring more than one million internally displaced Sudanese to return home, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). Since last year, a further 320,000 refugees have returned to Sudan, mainly from Egypt and South Sudan, some to assess the current situation before deciding to return.

According to the United Nations, large numbers of children are dying every month from malnutrition, measles and diarrhea, and other preventable diseases in Sudan, where armed conflict has displaced more than 5.3 million people from their homes. Between May 15 and September 14, at least 1,200 children under the age of five died from a deadly combination of a suspected measles outbreak and high malnutrition in nine camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Sudan's White Nile state alone.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) says three million children in the Central African Republic (CAR) face the highest recorded level of overlapping and interrelated crises and deprivation in the world.  The UN agency warned on Tuesday that ten years of protracted conflict and instability in the Central African country had rendered children invisible and at risk of being completely forgotten by international donors, the global media and the public.

The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said on Friday that some 400,000 Syrians have returned from neighboring countries since the fall of the Bashar al-Assad government on December 8 last year. Over the same period, more than one million internally displaced persons (IDPs) inside Syria have also returned, bringing the total number of Syrians who have gone home to over 1.4 million.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) is warning that severe disruptions to six of its most critical humanitarian operations are expected by the end of the year due to dwindling global funding, which could push millions into emergency levels of hunger and endanger the lives of millions of vulnerable people. This warning comes at a time when overall global humanitarian funding is drying up, with less than a quarter of this year's appeal being funded, and hunger reaching record highs.

As brutal gang violence continues to spill over from the capital Port-au-Prince into the Artibonite and other departments of Haiti, the United Nations Secretary-General on Friday joined the Haitian Prime Minister in strongly condemning a horrific gang attack in the town of Pont Sondé, outside the Haitian capital, that left at least 70 people dead, including at least 10 women and three infants. Guterres also called for urgent support for the Multinational Security Support (MSS) mission.

The situation in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) was the most neglected displacement crisis in the world in 2021, according to a report by the non-governmental organization Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC). The analysis, released June 1, lists the top ten least noticed displacement crises in the world in 2021.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has warned today that aid fatigue is growing at a time when a record number of people are fleeing conflict, persecution, human rights violations, climate change, and grinding poverty. According to the latest figures, 110 million people around the world are currently displaced within their home country or have sought refuge in other countries. 

The United Nations mission in the Central African Republic (CAR) has announced that it is working with local authorities in the Haut-Mbomou Prefecture, in the south-east of the country, to find a rapid solution to persisting insecurity.  The UN mission said Wednesday that clashes between armed groups and attacks against the Central African armed forces (FACA) have aggravated the humanitarian situation and led to massive displacements in the region. 

The United Nations and humanitarian partner organizations have today launched the 2024 Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan (HNRP) for South Sudan, targeting 6 million children, women, and men with the most acute needs.  In the forthcoming year, 9 million people in the country - a slight decrease from 2023 - are projected to be in need of some form of humanitarian assistance. Among those requiring humanitarian aid will be 4.9 million children.

The 2024 Humanitarian Response Plan for Mali was launched this week in Bamako, the capital of the country. The United Nations, along with humanitarian partner organizations, will need over US$700 million to assist more than 4.1 million people across the Sahel country in 2024, UN officials announced on Thursday. An estimated 7.1 million people in Mali require humanitarian assistance this year, among them are some 3.8 million children.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is warning that hundreds of thousands of people in South Sudan are at risk of going without life-saving assistance unless additional funding for the humanitarian response is received without delay. Some 9 million people - including 4.9 million children - in the country are in need of humanitarian aid, and the outlook for the coming months is worrying.

The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) warns that acute hunger in Afghanistan is no longer seasonal but a grueling daily reality for millions of people. WFP said today that two-thirds of the country’s population - or 28.3 million - will require humanitarian assistance next year, up from 24.4 million men, women and children in 2022. According to the UN agency, malnutrition in Afghanistan has reached the highest levels since records have been kept.

With an estimated 300 million people in need of humanitarian aid in 2024, the European Union (EU) has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the world's most vulnerable people. The European Commission (EC) announced on Monday that it had approved an initial annual humanitarian aid budget of more than €1.8 billion (US$1.93 billion) for this year, a slight increase of about €100 million compared to the previous year. In 2023, the European Union's (EU) initial humanitarian aid budget was €1.7 billion.