KHARTOUM, Sudan
More than 700 Sudanese were displaced in a single day from South and North Kordofan in southern Sudan due to worsening insecurity amid attacks by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said Monday.
The UN agency’s field teams estimated that 650 people fled Imran village in Ar-Rahad locality in North Kordofan on Saturday “as a result of escalating insecurity” and moved to several locations across the locality.
The IOM said its teams also documented the displacement of 150 people from Kaiga Al-Khayl in Kadugli locality, South Kordofan, on Saturday. Those displaced moved to various areas across South and West Kordofan, it added.
According to UN estimates, more than 41,000 people fled escalating violence in North and South Kordofan states during the past month.
Kadugli has faced a siege imposed by the RSF and the allied Sudan People’s Liberation Movement–North since the early months of the war, as well as repeated artillery and drone attacks.
There are no precise population figures for the city, which has seen repeated waves of displacement to surrounding areas.
On Friday, UNICEF representative in Sudan Sheldon Yett stated that famine has been confirmed in Kadugli.
The three Kordofan states – North, West, and South – have seen weeks of fierce fighting between the army and the RSF, prompting tens of thousands of people to flee.
Of Sudan’s 18 states, the RSF controls all five states of the Darfur region in the west, except for some northern parts of North Darfur that remain under army control. The army, in turn, holds most areas of the remaining 13 states in the south, north, east, and center, including the capital, Khartoum.
The conflict between the Sudanese army and the RSF, which began in April 2023, has since killed thousands of people and displaced millions of others.
