Sudan: Surge in Darfur displacement pushes Tawila into full-scale crisis, cholera spreading

Zawya

11-07-2025

A massive increase in people fleeing to Tawila in North Darfur over the last three months is propelling the small town into a full-scale humanitarian crisis. With the rainy season starting, hundreds of thousands of people who just barely escaped horror are bracing themselves for torrential storms, cholera outbreak and spiralling hunger.
Since April 2025, Tawila, has absorbed nearly 379,000 people fleeing repeated campaigns of mass destruction and year long siege on Zamzam Camp and Al Fasher, where famine has also been confirmed. Most are women (70 per cent), children, and people with disabilities, arriving into camps, mostly on foot after days of fleeing for their lives. Four new camps were set up to cope with the spiralling numbers and humanitarian organisations are overwhelmed, with prepositioned aid ahead of the rainy season already depleted.
'The situation in Tawila is collapsing,' said NRC's Sudan Country Director Shashwat Saraf. 'Families are surviving on scraps, sleeping in the dirt under roofs made out of straw, with barely any access to clean water and toilets. Cases of cholera are rising, and the rainy season is approaching fast, making living conditions more miserable.'
NRC's June 2025 assessment across four new camps in Tawila housing 213,000 people confirms:
Lack of access to water: only 21,000 people, or 10 per cent, have reliable water access.
Latrine shortages: approximately 2,684 households, or less than 10 per cent, have access to latrines, while 31,238 households are without access.
Severe food shortages: most families report that they are eating one meal a day or less.
Lack of schools: only 11 temporary learning spaces means that many children are unable to attend classes.
Major protection concerns: 39 per cent of women are pregnant or lactating, 22 per cent of households include persons with disabilities, and there is a lack of proper services and support
Uncertain future: 60 per cent of the people in the camps say they are intending to stay long-term, yet 27 per cent have no plan, reflecting fear and uncertainty.
The families in the camps have been fleeing scenes of extreme violence: April's raid on Zamzam and Abu Shouk camps left up to 400 dead, many raped, aid workers killed, and survivors risking their lives to flee into Tawila in desperation. Since April 2023, 782,000 people have been displaced from Al Fasher and Zamzam, including nearly 500,000 in April – May 2025 alone.
A separate assessment by aid agencies and local authorities in Al Fasher found 38 per cent of children under 5 at displacement sites suffer from acute malnutrition, 11 percent with severe acute malnutrition.
'The window for saving thousands of lives is closing fast,' Saraf added. 'We need funding and decisive action from the world's leaders to get aid trucks and relief teams to Tawila – without delays and restrictions from the warring parties – before this spirals completely out of control.'
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).