Kuwaiti, Saudi aid arrives in Sudan
Kuwait Red Crescent plans to dispatch medical staff, more aid soon
KHARTOUM: A ship boarding $1 million worth of medical aid sent from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia docked at Port Sudan on Sunday. The Kuwait Ambassador to Sudan Dr Fahad Al-Dhafiri said in remarks to KUNA that dispatch of the relief supplies from Kuwait Red Crescent Society and King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center was in line with an agreement that had been signed between the two sides for coordinating relief activities in Sudan and elsewhere in the world.
The KRCS had dispatched 190 tons of food and medical aid to Sudan last September, he said, indicating that more assistance would be earmarked for the stricken nation — including dispatch of medical cadres. Many Sudanese are suffering from shortage of necessities due to the ongoing infighting.
War has raged for more than a year between the regular military under army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces led by his former deputy Mohamed Hamdan Daglo. Media reported Sunday that at least 134 people have died at an hospital in the Darfur city of El-Fasher in western Sudan, including one MSF team member. El-Fasher in North Darfur is the only state capital in the vast western region not under RSF control and is a key humanitarian hub for a region on the brink of famine.
Port Sudan, the coastal city where Kuwaiti aid has been delivered, houses many of those displaced by the war. A majority have had to flee multiple times since the start of the war in April last year. They come from all over the country, where an eruption of violence in December forced more than half a million people to flee. Many of them were already displaced and had been seeking refuge in Wad Madani.
Across Sudan, humanitarian workers have been repeatedly targeted, harassed and killed by both sides. On Friday, a Sudanese Red Crescent volunteer was killed “while on duty by a gunshot in North Kordofan”, the International Committee of the Red Cross said. Since the war began in April last year, tens of thousands of people have been killed, including up to 15,000 in West Darfur town, UN experts said. Nearly nine million people have been forced from their homes. — Agencies