Against All Odds Food Reaches Sudan's Starving People

GENEVA, Switzerland, September 13, 2004 (ENS) - The World Food Program has opened up a new route across the wild Sahara Desert to deliver food to the 200,000 black African refugees from Darfur who are stuck in the refugee camps of eastern Chad, driven from their homes by Arab militias. The 2,800 kilometer (1,740 mile) journey from Libya’s Mediterranean coast avoids the impassable, muddy roads from Cameroon.

Twenty trucks loaded with 440 metric tons of wheat flour bought with a Swiss donation arrived in the town of Bahai late Wednesday after a 12 day drive from the southern Libyan ancient trading post of Al Kohfra, where the road ends and the desert sands begin.

“We covered the whole Sahara and experienced every part of it, said World Food Program (WFP) Public Information Officer Casey Kauffman, who was with the convoy to film the trip. "Flat, endless, pure sand desert with no reference for orientation; rolling chains of shifting sand dunes; sharp rocks; mountain regions of moonscapes and huge rock cliffs; rolling hills, red sand and spectacular rock formations."

Dunes of the Libyan Sahara (Photo credit unknown)

Tire punctures and more serious automotive mishaps delayed the relief convoy. To avoid the worst heat, the trucks traveled from early morning to noon and from 5 pm until late into the night. Afternoons were spent eating, drinking tea and napping under the trucks. For food, a goat or sheep was killed each day. The animals rode on the top of the trucks along with fuel, onions, watermelons, and spare tires.

In mid-July, the government of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya responded to WFP’s appeal for international assistance by signing a landmark 10 year agreement with WFP guaranteeing the safe passage of food and other UN relief supplies through Libya, destined for the displaced Sudanese.

The new route will allow WFP to move hundreds of extra tons of food per month to camps in Chad for many of the 200,000 men, women and children driven from their homes in Darfur.

Until now, WFP transported most food aid via the port of Douala, Cameroon, but heavy rains have made many of Chad’s roads unusable, blocking the movement of food at times for days at a time. The most direct route from the Chadian capital, N’djamena, to the refugee camps is impassable for much of the current rainy season.

Near the camps, flash floods have swallowed up several four-wheel drive aid agency vehicles and trucks carrying supplies.

Inside Darfur in western Sudan, the WFP overcame dangerous conditions to deliver food for nearly one million people in August, but the agency said at least 200,000 hungry people were not fed.

WFP food distribution at Diesa (Photo by Barry Came courtesy WFP)

August was the worst part of the rainy season in Darfur and large stretches of the "decrepit road system were rendered impassable," the WFP said.

Trucks full of food struggled to reach Darfur on the long drive from Port Sudan on the Red Sea. Many trucks were stranded on the banks of flooded wadis, often for days at a time.

The only rail line into Darfur was knocked out of service for five days in August after rains washed away its foundations and caused a serious derailment.

An example of the difficulties in getting food by road to people uprooted by attacks on their villages, was seen last Thursday when men who identified themselves as members of the rebel Sudan Liberation Army stopped and looted two trucks of 50 metric tons of WFP food on the road from Ed-Daein to the South Darfur capital of Nyala.

WFP truck loaded with food for Sudanese refugees bogs down on a rutted road in the rainy season. (Photo courtesy WFP)

To avoid problems such as those, the agency began dropping food packages by air to some of the most remote regions of Sudan in August, but even that has not always been possible. Bad weather forced some air drops of food to be postponed in West Darfur, the state worst affected by the rains. Downpours have frequently made West Darfur’s dirt runway at El-Geneina unusable by WFP transport aircraft carrying food to avoid dependence on land routes.

Almost 20 percent of the total population of Sudan is directly or indirectly affected by the conflict that has destroyed the socio-economic infrastructure, causing massive population displacement, and disrupted agricultural activities.

Villages are being attacked, looted and burned by rival militias. The inhabitants are being killed or displaced, and the food security of over a million people is at risk.

The conflict has affected 2.2 million people in Darfur and Eastern Chad, according to U.S. government, European Union and United Nations sources.

The most serious obstacle is the sheer scale of the crisis, WFP officials say. More than a million people who need aid are scattered across an area the size of France with minimal infrastructure.

Refugee camp in eastern Chad (Photo by Richard Lee courtesy WFP)

“When things go wrong, as they can easily do in Darfur, we have little ability to plug the gap, he said. “So food simply takes longer to reach the people who need it most.”

The numbers of hungry people will rise to two million in October, the WFP says, because many people not forced to flee their homes but still suffering the consequences of conflict in the region will be considered to be in need of food aid. The revised figure will require 35,000 tons of food to be delivered in Darfur every month.

The new Libyan corridor across the Sahara should allow year-round access to the refugee camps in both Chad’s northern and central border areas, as well as make food transport more efficient and secure.

But poor sanitation and dirty drinking water increase the threat posed by water-borne diseases such as typhoid, cholera and dysentery.

To date, the United States has been the largest donor to the WFP relief operations in Chad and Sudan, with donations totaling close to $1 billion.

The next largest donor is the European Commission at about $25 million. European countries, Australia and Japan have also contributed to the relief effort.

The United States September 9 formally presented to members of the Security Council a draft resolution on Sudan that asks the United Nations to establish an international commission to investigate whether acts of genocide have occurred in Darfur. The United States also endorses an expanded, "proactive" monitoring of the situation by the African Union.

After a three hour closed Security Council meeting, U.S. Ambassador John Danforth said that negotiations on the text will continue and he hopes "that we will pass a resolution next week."

The ambassador emphasized that the U.S. goal in presenting the resolution is to change the situation on the ground and improve the lives of the people of Darfur, not to impose sanctions or legally classify the situation in the region as genocide.

Danforth said the U.S. objective is "to save people's lives."

"There are people dying. They are dying by the day and we have to try to save their lives," the ambassador told journalists outside the council's chambers.

In a 30 day report, Secretary-General Kofi Annan and his special envoy for Sudan, Jan Pronk of the Netherlands, said that although Khartoum has taken steps to allow humanitarian aid to reach Darfur quickly, it has failed to disarm local militias in Darfur or stop attacks against civilians by the Jingaweit, two of the main Security Council requirements.

In testimony before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday, Secretary of State Colin Powell said that a U.S. investigation has "concluded that genocide has been committed in Darfur and that the government of Sudan and the Jingaweit bear responsibility and that genocide may still be occurring."