Sudan’s war has claimed thousands of lives, forced millions from their homes, and sparked economic turmoil across the region that is deepening the hunger crisis, warns the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) as the conflict approaches its one-year mark.

In Sudan, areas of agricultural land have turned into battlegrounds, while farms and businesses stand abandoned as people have fled for safety. There are huge cash shortages nationwide, and repeated cuts to communication channels hinder efforts to keep commerce going. Food prices in Sudan are 73 percent higher than last year and 350 percent above the five-year averages, exacerbated by the currency’s devaluation. The ripple effects are felt in South Sudan and Chad where disrupted trade and massive population displacements are straining resources and intensifying hunger.

“Millions of people in Sudan, South Sudan and Chad are being threatened by starvation because this war has laid waste to agriculture, businesses and national economies – leaving its victims hungry and penniless,” said WFP’s Executive Director Cindy McCain. “The fighting must stop now, or the region may soon become the world’s largest hunger crisis.” 

The lean season in Sudan is just around the corner. It is starting earlier and expected to run for longer because the war has severely limited the last harvest season. A crop assessment conducted by FAO shows national cereal production at 46 percent below 2023 levels and 40 percent below the five-year average as the conflict has destroyed swathes of farmland, both directly as well as indirectly by forcing farmers from their land. Meanwhile, fertilizers and fuel have become unaffordable for those farmers who can still tend their fields.

Sudan will be unable to finance the import of sufficient food stocks to cover the shortfall. Last year alone, the price of staple grains doubled and is expected to rise further because of the latest poor harvest. This will lead to even more severe food shortages during the lean season, with a devastating impact for the millions of people who are already struggling with record levels of hunger, disease, and malnutrition

South Sudan’s economy is plummeting as families grapple with hyperinflation and extreme currency depreciation, driven in part by a rupture in the country’s main oil export pipeline that runs through Sudan in March. Oil is the main source of revenue for South Sudan. Meanwhile, cross-border trade from Sudan – a lifeline for landlocked South Sudan – has come close to a standstill since the onset of the war.

This economic turmoil risks pushing one million people into severe food insecurity in South Sudan, where already over half the population – 7.1 million people – are acutely hungry, new modelling from WFP shows. Food prices have more than doubled in some areas and around four in five households in South Sudan may be unable to afford food essentials.

A similar scenario is playing out in Chad, where food prices in the east have nearly doubled in the last year. Border closures have severely restricted trade and the availability of food in the markets. Nearly half of all refugees and returnees in eastern Chad are facing acute hunger as the lean season approaches.

With fighting only intensifying, the trajectory of Sudan’s war remains deeply alarming: it will trigger the world’s largest hunger emergency as the impacts of the conflict reverberating around the entire region There are 28 million already food insecure people across Sudan, South Sudan, and Chad who will slip into even deeper and more severe levels of hunger.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of World Food Programme (WFP).

The Men5CV vaccine offers a powerful shield against the five major strains of the meningococcal bacteria – A, C, W, Y and X – which cause the disease. 

Known by the brand name MenFive, it provides broader protection than the vaccine currently used in much of Africa, which is only effective against the A strain. 

Defeating a ‘deadly foe’ 

“Meningitis is an old and deadly foe, but this new vaccine holds the potential to change the trajectory of the disease, preventing future outbreaks and saving many lives,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO Director-General.  

The rollout in Nigeria represents one step closer towards the goal of total elimination by 2030, he added. 

Meningitis is the inflammation of the tissues surrounding the brain and spinal cord and can be fatal. Symptoms often include headache, fever and stiff neck. 

There are multiple causes, including viral, bacterial, fungal and parasitic pathogens. The most serious – bacterial meningitis – can also result in blood poisoning and can seriously disable or kill within 24 hours after being contracted.   

Vaccination campaign 

Nigeria is among the 26 meningitis hyper-endemic countries of Africa, an area known as the African Meningitis Belt.  

WHO said 153 people died in an outbreak in Nigeria between 1 October 2023 and 11 March of this year. A vaccination campaign was launched in late March to reach more than a million people aged 29 and under. 

“Northern Nigeria, particularly the states of Jigawa, Bauchi and Yobe were badly hit by the deadly outbreak of meningitis, and this vaccine provides health workers with a new tool to both stop this outbreak but also put the country on a path to elimination,” said Prof. Muhammad Ali Pate of the Nigerian Ministry of Health and Social Welfare. 

WHO said the new vaccine has the potential to significantly reduce meningitis cases and advance progress in defeating the disease, which is especially important for countries like Nigeria where multiple serogroups are prevalent.  

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of UN News.

The commemoration in the General Assembly Hall was held to remember the victims and honour the survivors and those who tried to stop the genocide.

Focus was also on young people who have grown up in its shadow, and on countering hate speech which fuelled the killing and has become a growing global concern today. 

100 days of terror 

“The genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda 30 years ago is a stain on our collective consciousness and a brutal reminder of the legacy of colonialism, and the consequences of hate speech,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in his opening remarks. 

More than a million people – overwhelmingly Tutsi, but also Hutu and others who opposed the genocide – were slaughtered over 100 days, starting on 7 April 1994. Many were hacked to death with machetes. 

It was a period when “neighbours turned on neighbours, friends became murderous foes, and entire families were wiped out,” Mr. Guterres recalled. 

“The carnage was driven by an explicit intent to destroy members of a group simply because of their ethnic identity,” he said. 

Never again 

The President of the UN General Assembly, Dennis Francis, said the “horror born of a virulent and senseless level of hatred” that engulfed Rwanda three decades ago “should never be allowed to rear its venomous head again in the human conscience and heart.”

He urged people everywhere to learn about the dangerous consequences of hate speech, especially in the era of social media “where unguarded words we utter can spread like wildfire”, as well as the ramification of international inaction in the face of conflict.

“The genocide against the Tutsis had warning signs which were not fully heeded and it unfolded in full view of the global community – which dismally failed Rwanda by not taking swift action to prevent or stop it,” he said. 

“Let us always remember that peace requires an active effort – and most importantly, prevention.” 

Carrying the memories 

Rwandan song writer and author Claver Irakoze was just a child when the unspeakable violence began. His father taught at a secondary school in Kapagyi, located roughly 40 kilometres southwest of the capital, Kigali, and the family sought shelter there. 

Early on the morning of 28 April, soldiers came to the school and took away 61 men, including his father, loading them “like cargo” onto a truck.  

“That was my last time I saw my father,” he said. “I remember him faintly waving good-bye at me, so powerlessly. It is an image that still comes to my mind whenever I think about him.” 

Mr. Irakoze has since written two children’s books to teach lessons of hope and healing. He is also a husband and the father of a boy, 9, and a girl, 11 – the same age he was when the genocide began.

“Our killers wanted us wiped out, but we are here,” he said. “And through us and our children, we carry the memory of those we lost.” 

Lighting the way forward 

Rwanda has risen from the ashes “becoming an outstanding example of what is possible when a nation chooses the path of reconciliation and renewal,” said Ernest Rwamucyo, the country’s Ambassador to the UN. 

He paid tribute to Mr. Irakoze and other survivors who illuminate the path to healing and reconciliation.  

“In acknowledging the sacrifices made by survivors, we reaffirm our collective resolve that the lessons of history are never forgotten. Their narratives compel us to redouble our efforts in the pursuits of justice, accountability and peace.” 

Remember. Unite. Renew. 

As part of the commemorative events, the UN Department of Global Communications has mounted an exhibit in the Secretariat lobby – Remember.  Unite.  Renew. – that highlights the power of post-genocide reconciliation, the potentially deadly impact of hate speech and what visitors can do to say #NoToHate. 

At the heart of the exhibit is the story of Laurence Niyonangira, who fled the killings in her community, led by former neighbours following targeted hate speech. She lost 37 family members in the genocide. 

“As survivors, we can only heal our wounds with the people who created them,” she said on the reconciliation process with Xavier Nemeye, one of the men who killed her mother and sister.  

The exhibit includes an interactive panel where visitors can voice their support for tolerance and pledge to speak out against hate speech. 

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of UN News.

Mali’s transitional military government should immediately reverse its suspension of political parties and associations, Human Rights Watch said today. The suspension violates both Malian law and the rights to freedom of expression, association, and assembly under international human rights law.

On April 10, 2024, the council of ministers adopted a decree suspending the activities of political parties and associations across the country “until further notice.” On April 11, the Malian communications regulatory body (Haute autorité de la communication) directed all media to stop “broadcasting and publishing the activities” of political parties and associations. The action appeared to be in response to the March 31 call by more than 80 political parties and associations for a return to constitutional order by holding presidential elections as soon as possible. The military junta, which seized power in a coup in May 2021, had announced in September that the elections scheduled for March 26 would be delayed indefinitely for technical reasons.

“The Malian authorities apparently suspended all political parties and associations because they didn’t like their call to hold democratic elections,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Mali’s junta, like all governments, needs to respect human rights, and should immediately lift the suspension.”

Following months of renewed hostilities between separatist armed groups and Malian forces in the northern part of the country, Col. Assimi Goita, Mali’s military president, announced on December 31, 2023, the establishment of an “inter-Malian dialogue for peace and reconciliation,” aimed at eliminating “the roots of community and intercommunity conflicts” by prioritizing “national ownership of the peace process.” In an April 10 news release, Col. Abdoulaye Maïga, the minister of territorial administration, claimed the suspension of political parties and associations was justified to ensure that the inter-Malian dialogue “[would] take place in a climate of serenity and not cacophony.”

“The minister’s declaration has contradictions,” said a member of the political party African Solidarity for Democracy and Independence (Solidarité africaine pour la démocratie et l’indépendance, SADI). “Authorities are inviting people to the national dialogue, and at the same time are stripping them of their political clothes. … Who do they [authorities] want to attend the dialogue? People should be entitled to participate both as citizens and as political leaders or members of political parties.”

In January, the authorities took legal action against the SADI party, threatening to dissolve it, following a message posted on social networks by its leader, Oumar Mariko. Mariko had alleged that the Malian armed forces had committed war crimes against members of the Strategic Permanent Framework (Cadre stratégique permanent), a coalition of armed and political groups from northern Mali.

Since the military coup, Mali’s junta has increasingly cracked down on peaceful dissent, political opposition, civil society, and the media, shrinking the country’s civic space, Human Rights Watch said.

On March 13, the minister of territorial administration dissolved the Association of Pupils and Students of Mali (L’Association des élèves et étudiants du Mali) accusing its members of “violence and clashes in schools and universities.” The association was the fourth organization that the government dissolved in less than four months. On March 6, the authorities had dissolved the Coordination of Movements, Associations, and Sympathizers of Imam Mahmoud Dicko (Coordination des mouvements, associations et sympathisants de l’imam Mahmoud Dicko), which had been calling for presidential elections as part of restoring civilian democratic rule, accusing it of “destabilization and threat to public security.”

On February 28, the authorities had dissolved the political organization Kaoural Renewal (Kaoural Renouveau), citing “defamatory and subversive remarks” against the military junta. And on December 20, the authorities had dissolved the Observatory for Elections and Good Governance (Observatoire pour les élections et la bonne gouvernance), a civil society group that monitored the fairness of elections, accusing its chairman of “statements likely to disturb public order.”

The junta has also targeted dissidents and whistleblowers. On March 4, the authorities forcibly disappeared gendarmerie Col. Alpha Yaya Sangaré, who had recently published a book about abuses by the Malian armed forces. His whereabouts remain unknown.

A Malian human rights activist said that “the authorities want to maintain a monopoly over political power by denying opponents the right to express their views and conduct political activities.”

Mali’s constitution and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Mali ratified in 1974, protect the rights to freedom of association, expression, and peaceful assembly. Article 25 of the ICCPR ensures the right of citizens to participate in public affairs. The United Nations Human Rights Committee, the body of independent experts that monitor state compliance with the convention, has upheld everyone’s right to “join organizations and associations concerned with political and public affairs.”

“The junta’s decision to suspend political parties is part of its relentless crackdown on peaceful opposition and dissent,” Allegrozzi said. “The authorities should immediately lift the suspension, allow the political parties and associations to operate freely, and commit to upholding fundamental rights and freedoms.”

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Human Rights Watch (HRW).