The world has turned its back on Sudan as catastrophic war rages on, says aid worker

Jan Egeland says the stories he’s heard from Sudanese war refugees have left him “utterly shaken.” And yet, the international aid worker says nobody seems to care.

With world leaders and global headlines focused on the war in Ukraine and the bombardment of Gaza, aid organizations say one of the most devastating conflicts on the planet is not getting the attention it needs. 

For 10 months, Sudan’s armed forces have been at war with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, forcing more than 1.7 million people to flee the country, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), which works with displaced people around the world. 

About 700,000 of those people have ended up in neighbouring Chad, itself one of the poorest countries in the world. 

The crisis has prompted several aid organizations, including the NRC and UNICEF, to issue urgent pleas for international aid.

Global Affairs Canada spokesperson Pierre Cuguen told CBC that Canada is “deeply concerned by the ongoing conflict in Sudan” and “continues to call on the parties to allow and facilitate rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief for civilians in need.”

He said the federal government allocated $170 million in humanitarian aid to several African countries, including Chad, last year, $40 million of which “has gone to providing humanitarian assistance inside Sudan.”

Egeland, secretary-general of the NRC, has just returned home from a mission to the Sudanese refugee camps in Chad. Here is part of his conversation with As It Happens host Nil Köksal.

You were just at the border meeting with refugees. What stands out from those conversations? 

I must say, I’m utterly shaken. I’m numb by hearing the story after story from family after family of horrific violence — gang rapes, the killing of male youth, parents being killed in front of their children. And it’s not one family here or there that has these stories. All have these stories. 

And we’re talking about 700,000 people who have fled to eastern Chad from Darfur [in western Sudan], where there has been the most horrific, ethnically oriented violence, especially against the Masalit tribe, which now have had to flee to the poorest place on Earth, which is eastern Chad. 

What is their reality day-to-day when they get to Chad, given the circumstances there? 

I wish they would then get the best possible care and the best possible protection and the best possible aid. But we’re underfunded and overstretched beyond belief as aid groups in eastern Chad, as we are as aid groups inside Darfur. 

The world has forgotten that Sudan has had one of the worst wars in recent memory. It’s the highest number of internally displaced on the planet. More than Ukraine. More than Syria. More than anywhere else. And those who have managed to flee the country to Chad do not receive assistance. 

Twenty years ago, Darfur was every month on the agenda of President [George W.] Bush in the United States, prime minister [Tony] Blair in London, the Canadian prime minister, the French president, et cetera. Where is the outrage today? 

Why do you feel the world has forgotten? 

No. 1, it seems we’re even worse now than before in being able to handle more than one crisis at a time. So it’s Ukraine and it is the horrors of Gaza that is taking all attention. 

But then I think there’s also this introvert[ed], nationalistic wind that basically means that there is less interest in these young women who have had their life destroyed because of sexual violence, these orphans. I met a mother. She had eight children. She had taken in five orphans. I mean, you can’t believe it, really. 

And our operation [in Sudan] is less than 10 per cent funded for 2024. 

When you talk about being there 20 years ago, the response, as you’ve said, is quite different. What is different in terms of what you’re seeing on the ground then and now? 

They had horrible stories at that time. And the world was outraged. 

It’s the same kind of horrific violence. And it’s ethnically based, now as then. It’s just much bigger now. And there should, therefore, be more attention than there was 20 years ago. 

I remember at that time, too, in addition to the more important political attention and funding and that kind of focus, there were also celebrities getting in front of the story and saying, “This is why the world should care.” Does that help? Should that be happening now? 

That always helps. Because it sort of galvanizes attention. 

The media was more interested. There was political support. The [United Nations] Security Council was discussing it. I met with George Clooney, as he was briefing the Security Council just after I was briefing the Security Council. Doesn’t happen today. 

We need a reboot of global compassion so that it is needs, and needs alone, that decides who gets attention, who gets aid, who gets resources in a world that should be able to help people like the ones I’ve seen and been with in recent days. 

When you say it should be needs, what do you think is overtaking that? 

Apparently strategic interests, political interests [and] regional interests.

I’m also amazed by how easy it seems to be for these men with guns and power who are tearing their own country, Sudan, and [an] ancient civilization apart, and letting the children die as they do it. 

They do not lack resources. They do not lack arms. We do not have the aid for the victims. They can apparently keep fighting forever. 

So where are the Gulf countries and others that have interests here? Where is the aid from them? 

Reuters is reporting that France is set to hold ministerial meetings in mid-April to help Sudan and its neighbouring countries cope with the fallout of the war. The French foreign minister is agreeing with you, saying this cannot become a forgotten crisis. Does that give you any hope that the people are paying attention? 

It gives me some hope. And the EU commissioner for aid was here. 

But it’s not making any waves. Where are the aid packages? Where’s what we were able to muster for Ukraine?

What would you like to hear from the Canadian government? 

I’d like to see an initiative of support from their side. And it’s important that we have like-minded countries that have always professed to seek to defend human rights wherever they are trampled on. This is such a case. I hope to see even more Canadian initiatives and more Canadian funding for the aid operation here. 

What is going to happen to those women you met and the orphans? The women who suffered sexual assaults? 

The hardest thing [about] these kinds of missions, when you’re really there and spend so much time with people that have suffered so much, is to leave a place. Because I cannot guarantee there will be the aid that is needed. 

There was one … young woman, 28 years old. She cried continuously for an hour as she told [me] about how she had been abused, sexually abused, beyond belief in her own home from these militias, the Janjaweed she called them, in her home. She was physically and mentally destroyed, really, by this. 

She wanted to be an accountant. She lacks two years of studies to become an accountant. Her dream is to sit in the bank and help people. And she said, “All my dreams are gone. Now I sit in a tent and I hardly get enough food. All my dreams are gone.”

I hope we will not fail women like that, children like that, people like that.