WFP Aid Trucks Reach Sudan’s Darfur After 6-Month Closure

After a six-month closure, the first aid trucks prepared by the United Nations World Food Program (WFP) crossed Adre border to deliver much-needed aid for war-ravaged West Darfur, according to video material published by WFP.

The trucks carried sorghum, pulses, oil and rice to serve nearly 13,000 Sudanese people at risk of famine in Kereneik in West Darfur, WFP said in a statement.

This comes after Sudan's sovereign council said last week it would allow the use of the Adre border crossing with Chad for three months - a move long waited by aid agencies seeking to send aid into areas of the Darfur region that are threatened with famine.

Global monitors say that more than 6 million people face food insecurity across Darfur, which is mostly controlled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the army's rival in a 16-month war, and that famine has taken hold in North Darfur's Zamzam camp.

The army-aligned government blocked aid deliveries in February through the Adre crossing into territory controlled by the RSF, alleging that it was being used for weapons deliveries.

The country’s dire humanitarian crisis is a result of a war started more than a year ago between the country’s military and a rival paramilitary group. Since mid-April 2023, more than 18,800 people have been killed in the conflict and more than 33,000 have been injured, according to the U.N.

Adre was closed in February, but WFP was able to send two convoys through in March and April.

Without Adre, WFP was forced to use a longer route into North Darfur through the Tine crossing in Chad.

The U.N. has called Sudan the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. In addition to the disastrous hunger levels, the International Organization for Migration reports more than 10.7 million people, nearly half of them children, are displaced inside Sudan and more than 2 million people have fled as refugees into neighboring countries.