The director of international programmes for aid agency Concern, Carol Morgan has described the situation in Sudan as “quite challenging”.
“We have 160 staff in Sudan, and so they are in Khartoum, in Kordofan and West Darfur. At the moment, the situation is really quite challenging”, she told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland.
“Our staff are remaining indoors. They have limited supplies. They haven't been able to go outside since the conflict started on Saturday morning. The power has been on and off. They have backup generators, but again, fuel is running out. So at the moment, they are conserving any electricity or power they have so they can charge up the phones to ensure that they can keep going with communication.
“We have what we call a communication tree. So we're in touch with staff on a daily basis. And then we also have a follow-up from head office here. But it is quite difficult. They are hearing shelling, artillery fire. And it's just a very difficult situation”.
Concern has been operating in Sudan for 37 years in the areas of nutrition and health, especially for mothers and children, explained Ms Morgan.
“Sudan has always been quite a difficult operating environment and really the situation deteriorated from 2009 onwards when President al-Bashir was removed from power. The current situation is that we have 16 million people in need of assistance just to meet the basic needs in Sudan. And 2.5 million people have been displaced. And with the ongoing conflict and again, even though this has erupted now in Khartoum, there has been a lot of conflict.
“The health sector, where we work is really very difficult. There's only about enough health personnel to cover 17 percent of the population. We have a situation where one in ten children die from diarrhea. And again, it's very difficult to access medicines and with the war in Ukraine, super inflation, very high levels of inflation up to 423 percent”.
The extraordinary levels of inflation mean that even If people have money to purchase food, it is very difficult to do so, added Ms Morgan.
