Latest news with #Khartoum
CNN
8 hours ago
- General
- CNN
A photographer shows the shocking reality of Sudan's civil war
Photojournalist Giles Clarke was granted rare access to Sudan to document the impact of its brutal civil war. This is what he saw.
CNN
8 hours ago
- General
- CNN
A photographer shows the shocking reality of Sudan's civil war
Photojournalist Giles Clarke was granted rare access to Sudan to document the impact of its brutal civil war. This is what he saw.
CNN
9 hours ago
- General
- CNN
A photographer shows the shocking reality of Sudan's civil war
Photojournalist Giles Clarke was granted rare access to Sudan to document the impact of its brutal civil war. This is what he saw.
Free Malaysia Today
15 hours ago
- Health
- Free Malaysia Today
Paramilitaries claim capture of key Sudanese towns
The war in Sudan has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced 13 million. (Reuters pic) PORT SUDAN : Paramilitary forces fighting Sudan's military have said they captured two strategic towns in the war-ravaged nation, which has been hit by a cholera outbreak that killed 70 people in the capital this week. For more than two years Africa's third-largest country has been engulfed by a war between the army, led by the nation's de facto ruler, general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The surge in cholera infections comes weeks after drone strikes blamed on the RSF knocked out water and electricity supplies across the capital Khartoum, which now faces a mounting health emergency. The RSF announced yesterday that its forces had retaken the key towns of Dibeibat, in South Kordofan state, and Al-Khoei, in West Kordofan state, which border South Sudan. 'The liberation of Dibeibat, followed by Al-Khoei, not only means a field victory; it also consolidates the complete control of the RSF over most of the Kordofan region,' an RSF spokesman said in a statement. Al-Khoei, located around 100km from El-Obeid – a crossroads between Khartoum and the Darfur region – had been briefly recaptured by the army this month. Residents confirmed to AFP that Dibeibat, which links the states of North and South Kordofan, was now under RSF control. The conflict has effectively split Sudan in two: the army controls the centre, east and north of the country, while paramilitaries hold almost all of Darfur in the west and parts of the south. The war has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced 13 million and created what the United Nations has described as the world's worst humanitarian crisis. Cholera outbreak Last week, the military-backed government said it had dislodged RSF fighters from their last bases in Khartoum state, two months after retaking the heart of the capital from the paramilitaries. Khartoum has been a battleground throughout the war and remains devastated, with health and sanitation infrastructure barely functioning. Up to 90% of hospitals in the conflict's main battlegrounds have been forced out of service by the fighting. Now the capital is facing a major health crisis. A cholera outbreak claimed 70 lives on Tuesday and Wednesday, the health ministry for Khartoum state said yesterday. Health officials also recorded more than 2,100 new infections over the same two days. But the UN's humanitarian agency, Ocha, said it is 'difficult to assess the true scale of the outbreak' with 'significant discrepancies' in official data. The federal health ministry reported 172 deaths in the week to Tuesday, 90% of them in Khartoum state. Authorities said 89% of patients in isolation centres are recovering, but warn that deteriorating environmental conditions are driving a surge in cases. Cholera vaccinations have begun in Jebel Awila, the hardest-hit district in Khartoum, UN chief Antonio Guterres's spokesman said yesterday. Meanwhile the World Health Organization had delivered more than 22 metric tonnes of cholera and emergency health supplies, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. 'On the brink' Cholera is endemic to Sudan, but outbreaks have become worse and more frequent since the war broke out. Since August, health authorities have recorded more than 65,000 cases and over 1,700 deaths across 12 of Sudan's 18 states. 'Sudan is on the brink of a full-scale public health disaster,' said Eatizaz Yousif, the International Rescue Committee's Sudan director. 'The combination of conflict, displacement, destroyed critical infrastructure and limited access to clean water is fuelling the resurgence of cholera and other deadly diseases.' Aid agencies warn that without urgent action, the spread of disease is likely to worsen with the arrival of the rainy season next month, which severely limits humanitarian access. Sudan's government also faces US sanctions over allegations by Washington that the Sudanese military used chemical weapons last year in its war against the RSF. Yesterday, Sudan's foreign ministry announced the creation of a national committee to investigate the charge, while expressing its 'disbelief in the validity of the US administration's accusations'.
Free Malaysia Today
15 hours ago
- Health
- Free Malaysia Today
RSF drone strike kills 6 in Sudan hospital as cholera rages
The United Nations says the conflict in Sudan has created the world's biggest hunger and displacement crises. (EPA Images pic) KHARTOUM : Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) bombarded the key southern city of El-Obeid yesterday, killing six people in a hospital, as doctors in the capital Khartoum fought to contain a cholera outbreak. World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said they were 'appalled' by the latest strike, adding: 'Attacks on health must stop. We call for protection of all health infrastructure and health personnel. The best medicine is peace.' An army source told AFP the drone strike on the Social Insurance Hospital, which also wounded 12, was part of a simultaneous strike on residential areas of the city with heavy artillery. The bombardment had also hit a second hospital in the city centre, the source added. A medical source at El-Obeid Hospital, the city's main facility, confirmed the toll. El-Obeid, a strategic city 400km southwest of Khartoum, was besieged by the RSF for nearly two years before the regular army broke the siege in February. It was one of a series of counter-offensives that later saw the army recapture Khartoum. The city, which the RSF has repeatedly bombarded, is a key staging post on the army's supply route to the west, where the besieged city of El-Fasher is the only state capital in the vast Darfur region still under its control. The RSF and the army have clashed repeatedly along the road between El-Obeid and El-Fasher in recent weeks. On Thursday, the paramilitaries said they retook the town of Al-Khoei, around 100km west of El-Obeid, after the army recaptured it earlier this month. The war between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, has killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted 13 million since it erupted in April 2023. The United Nations says the conflict has created the world's biggest hunger and displacement crises. In Khartoum, where a cholera outbreak has killed dozens this week, doctors struggled to treat patients with dwindling supplies as the disease rapidly spread. 'We are using all available means to limit its spread and treat infected patients,' Dr Hamad Adel, with Doctors Without Borders (MSF), told AFP from Bashair Hospital. Patients lay on rusted metal beds, receiving IV drips in a makeshift isolation centre fashioned out of a tent in the sweltering 40°C heat, AFPTV footage showed. In a dedicated section, children lay side by side, emaciated and exhausted in the midst of what aid groups warn is a public health disaster. Cholera, an acute diarrhoeal illness caused by ingesting contaminated water or food, is easily preventable and treatable with clean water, sanitation and medical care – all now in short supply in Khartoum. In other overwhelmed hospitals across the war-ravaged capital, medics have been forced to lay patients on floors in hallways and courtyards. The outbreak has been blamed on power outages caused by RSF drone attacks on the capital's power stations, which cut access to clean water for millions across the city this month. Cholera is endemic to Sudan, but outbreaks have become worse and more frequent since the war has decimated the country's already fragile health system. Up to 90% of hospitals in the conflict's main battlegrounds have at some point been forced shut, according to the doctors' union. The war has effectively split Sudan in two, with the army holding the centre, east and north, while the paramilitaries and their allies control nearly all of Darfur and parts of the south. The RSF has failed to seize El-Fasher, which would consolidate its hold on Darfur, but has continued to pound the city, with starving civilians trapped inside. The UN World Food Programme said Thursday its facility had been 'hit and damaged by RSF repeated shelling'. The US – which has sanctioned both Burhan and Daglo – has condemned the bombing. 'Safe, sustained humanitarian access is critical and violations that endanger civilians and relief efforts demand serious attention,' said senior Africa adviser Massad Boulos. Since losing Khartoum in March, the RSF has adopted a two-pronged strategy: long-range drone strikes on army-held cities accompanied by a counter-offensive in the south. On Thursday, the paramilitaries announced they had captured Dibeibat in South Kordofan state. Swathes of South Kordofan are controlled by a rebel group allied with the RSF.
