Drone strikes on Port Sudan area threaten UN humanitarian hub operations: UN

UNITED NATIONS, May 6 (Xinhua) -- Intensifying drone attacks in the Port Sudan area -- the UN humanitarian aid hub for Sudan -- are increasing threats to aid delivery, a UN spokesman said on Tuesday.

"Our humanitarian colleagues said they're deeply concerned by the intensifying drone attacks on civilian infrastructure in Port Sudan, in the east of the country," said Farhan Haq, the deputy spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. They already forced at least a temporary halt to aid aircraft operations.

Haq said drone attacks on Tuesday reportedly struck the airport area, a fuel storage facility and a power transformer. No UN personnel or facilities were directly affected by the strikes.

Xinhua reported from Khartoum that although no group has officially claimed responsibility for the drone attacks, the Sudanese military has blamed the rebel paramilitary Rapid Support Forces for the drone attacks, which started on Sunday.

Haq said the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that the latest violence poses a growing risk to the safety of humanitarian staff and operations, with flights of the UN Humanitarian Air Service both to and from Port Sudan on hold.

The spokesman said there were prolonged power outages due to drone attacks targeting power stations and facilities elsewhere in Sudan. He said they continue to disrupt civilian life.

"This is the case in Northern State, where a one-month power blackout prevented farmers from running electrical water pumps, leading to the destruction of more than 84 square kilometres of crops," Haq said. "In River Nile State, the targeted destruction of power infrastructure has led to severe water supply shortages."

Haq said that despite the violence, the United Nations continues to assist the most vulnerable people. In East Darfur, humanitarian organizations mobilized aid for 35,000 people in the town of Ed Daein who had fled from Khartoum and Al Jazirah states.

There's another threat to the displaced in Sudan.

"We are scaling up water, sanitation and hygiene efforts and public health outreach to curb the spread of hepatitis E," detected in Kassala State, the spokesman said.

In neighboring Chad, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) is gravely concerned by the rapidly increasing number of Sudanese refugees crossing into eastern Chad. Nearly 20,000 people - primarily women and children - have arrived there in the past two weeks alone.

"This sudden influx reflects the escalating violence in Sudan's North Darfur region, particularly in and around El Fasher, which is triggering mass displacement," UNHCR said. "Refugees arriving in Chad report that over 10,000 people are still on the way, trying to reach the border to escape the violence."

A rapid protection assessment by UNHCR and its partners indicated that 76 percent of the newly arrived refugees were subjected to serious protection incidents, including extortion, theft and sexual violence.

The agency said that Chad already hosts 1.3 million refugees, including 794,000 arrivals from Sudan since the conflict began more than two years ago. While the country continues to show remarkable solidarity in hosting refugees, it cannot bear this burden alone.

UNHCR urges the international community to step up support for the response urgently. Only 20 percent of the 409 million U.S. dollars required to respond to the refugee crisis in Chad has been funded. ■