The US decision to suspend external aid increases the catastrophic hunger crisis in Sudan, where millions of diseases associated with malnutrition die.

Since he took office in January, the administration of US President Donald Trump has developed a leave or launched the vast majority of employees of the United States Agency for International Development (USA International Development Agency) Almost temporarily stops all international projects It is funded.

Last year, the United States Agency for International Development contributed 44 percent to Sudan’s humanitarian response of $ 1.8 billion, according to the United Nations.

Part of this amount went to support the response rooms of emergency situations (ERRS), which are relief groups in neighborhoods that support hundreds of “community kitchens” throughout the country.

“About 80 percent of the 1460 community kitchens have been closed through Sudan [when USAID paused all funding]Hajuj Coca, error spokesman in the state of Khartoum, said.

Fill the gap

Since the power struggle between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Military Support Forces (RSF) erupted in the civil war in April 2023, mass kitchens have kept hundreds of thousands of people alive. A deliberate disability to help by the warring partiesAccording to local and foreign relief workers.

Despite the efforts made by volunteers in ERR, more than 600,000 people in Sudan deal with famine levels of hunger, and about eight million are about to slip into famine, according to the classification of the integrated food security phase of the United Nations (IPC).

Stopping the financing of the US International Development Agency is now risking a double hunger crisis.

According to Iyad Agha, the humanitarian coordinator of international NGOs in Sudan, some organizations have obtained exemptions from the United States government to continue the management of life -saving services.

However, many of these services were eventually finished after a later review by the United States decided that it is not necessary to maintain life. A few days later, the Trump administration reflected some termination and allowed some services to appeal.

Aga said that Washington’s decisions appear “completely random.”

“Non -governmental organizations are paralyzed and do not know how to advance in chaos, confusion and the affected people [who need aid in Sudan] It is the most affected by all this chaos. “

“The problem is that if some other donors want to intervene [for the absence of USAID] there [a large gap] To fulfill, “Aga added.

The mistakes have taken things in their hands to find alternative financing.

Coca said that society kitchens had requested funding from Sudanese diaspora and smaller charitable organizations in order to continue to provide meals to besieged civilians during the holy month of Ramadan, which started earlier in March.

Coca said that their efforts helped hundreds of community kitchens to reopen it throughout the country, but 63 percent are still closed since the US government stopped most of the foreign aid.

There is only much that we can do. Simply, there is not enough food for people. “

“But we started a campaign on the Internet for people to donate and during Ramadan, people tend to donate more during this time,” he added.

Obstacles and looting

Both sides say in the civil war of Sudan about generating the hunger crisis, says local and foreign relief workers.

One of the issues that some relief workers were martyred The United Nations agencies recognize the Sudanese army as a government of reality.

This policy enabled the army to approve or reject aid shipments across the borders of neighboring countries such as Chad and South Sudan, which is not controlled by the army. Critics previously told Al -Jazeera that the humanitarian field should work with the relevant authorities in each field of Sudan in order to reach the largest possible number of those in need.

In addition, the United Nations agencies that the army as a government in reality must adopt all humanitarian operations from Port Sudan, which makes it difficult in a logistical point of view to reach remote areas such as the Nuba Mountains in southern Kordovan and the sprawling Darfur region.

He also accused the army of imposing bureaucratic obstacles to obstructing and delaying aid shipments.

“The army’s procedures are very stressful. Linny Kinsley, WFP spokesman (WFP), explained.

“We have to deal with the various authorities: military intelligence, the Humanitarian Aid Committee, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, General Intelligence Services and National Intelligence Services.

Basically, for any [aid truck to move]”We need to get a character of all these agencies,” she told Al -Jazeera Island.

Analysts and relief workers also accuse SAF of banning aid to areas under RSF control. But army spokesman Nabil Abdullah has repeatedly denied this accusation and criticized RSF to civilians who are starving.

Hind App, a spokesman for “Err In”, a sprawling neighborhood in Khartoum, has accused RSF of exacerbating the hunger crisis.

She said that the group looted all the main markets in Khartoum before Ramadan and that many civilians are hesitating to leave their neighborhoods to search for food for fear that it can be attacked at RSF checkpoints.

“People are afraid of fleeing because RSF often takes away people from their money and phones,” she told Al -Jazeera.

Al -Jazeera contacted the press office of RSF to comment on allegations that its fighters were stealing civilians at the threat of weapons and the looting of the markets, but the group did not respond before publishing.

Security and hunger

With the escalation of the fighting between RSF and the Sudanese Army, local relief groups and relief agencies find it difficult to reach the trapped civilians.

In the displacement camp in Zamzam, with more than 500,000 people in North Darfur and struggling to survive from a famine, bloody weapons were forced to suspend relief operations when RSF bombed the camp on February 10 and 11.

The World Food Program provides duties of about 60,000 people in Zamzam through a local organization.

Our partners have forced the Earth to evacuate. They were forced to run for their lives [due to RSF shelling] Kinsley, the agency’s spokesperson, said, so why we had to stop the aid.

The battle for Khartoum also causes a great displacement throughout the Shaarq El-Nile, pushing the remaining common kitchens to try to feed thousands of new arrivals.

With people grow more despair, Coca says that many are trying to search for fish in the Nile or grow vegetables in their gardens, however the amount of food that most people can barely eat.

He pointed out that the mistakes are communicating with the European Union, as well as United Nations agencies, to try to fill the gap left by the United States Agency for International Development. If no one ascends, Coca warns that hundreds of thousands of people will starve and die from bad diseases.

We are talking about 1.8 million people who benefit from these kitchens. What does it mean if they can no longer get food? He asked Coca.

“People are already ready. We are [as ERRs] We are doing our best to prevent more areas in Sudan from slipping into full famine. But if this is [food shortage] It continues, then there will be more and more starvation pockets throughout the country. “