Sudan Conflict Straining Fragility of Its Neighbors

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Highlights

The conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) commanded by General Abdel Fattah al Burhan and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) headed by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo has triggered the fragmentation of Africa’s third largest country with a population of 47 million people. Sudan now represents the largest displacement crisis in the world with 11.4 million Sudanese internally displaced and more than 3.3 million having have fled the country since the start of hostilities.

As a result of the conflict, the United Nations estimates that 756,000 people could face catastrophic food shortages and 9 million people are confronting emergency conditions.  Hundreds are estimated to be dying from starvation and hunger-related disease each day.” Assessments of excess mortalities suggest that more than 60,000 people have died in Khartoum state alone. Nationally, estimates are that roughly 150,000 civilians have been killed during conflict.

The conflict between the military factions has thrown into turmoil a region that was already straining under record levels of humanitarian stresses. Even prior to the outbreak of conflict in Sudan, there were more than 13 million people in Sudan and its 7 neighbors who were refugees or internally displaced (IDP). More than 40 million people in these countries were facing acute food insecurity. Resources to assist these populations will now be even further stretched.

This reality underscores that each of Sudan’s neighbors is currently or was recently struggling with their own conflict or political instability. It also highlights the compounding effects that each of the region’s crises are having on one another.

Sudan had already been hosting over 1.1 million refugees from its neighbors, as well as over 3.8 million of its own internally displaced (out of a population of 45 million) prior to April 2023. Almost 30 percent of the refugees in Sudan were living in Khartoum and are now trying to evade the fighting there.

The majority of IDPs (79 percent) were in camps in Darfur in the west of the country. Still recovering from the genocide that killed an estimated 350,000 in the 2000’s, the region has once again become a renewed focal point of conflict and further displacement. The locality of Al Fasher in North Darfur, with a population of roughly 1.5 million people (including an estimated 737,900 IDPs), is under siege by the RSF. Estimates are that 45 percent of the people in Zamzam Camp (with a population of over 500,000) may be experiencing IPC Level 4 acute food insecurity (Emergency) and 15 percent are experiencing IPC Level 5 (Catastrophe/Famine). Similar conditions are faced in two other camps in the Al Fasher region.

Should Al Fasher fall, there is a strong likelihood of mass atrocities there and elsewhere. In other parts of Darfur, for example, there has been a systematic destruction of critical civilian infrastructure and a pattern of ethnically motivated violence committed by Arab militias backed by the RSF, primarily targeting men from the Masalit community. Following the defection of a RSF commander in Al Jazirah State, the RSF unleashed a wave of atrocities—rape, food poisoning, and mass killings of civilians—against Al Jazirahan villages in retaliation and as a warning to other would-be defectors.

Combined with pre-conflict displacements, UN agencies estimate that there are now more than 11.5 million people internally displaced and more than 3.3 million people have fled to neighbors Egypt, Chad, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Libya, and Central African Republic (CAR)—countries that are facing their own stressors. These figures are surely an undercount as humanitarian access and communications with much of the country have been cut. The UN estimates that 25 million people (roughly half the population) are in need of assistance.

Egypt

Egypt has been a major route for Sudanese refugees escaping from Khartoum. So far, it has received more than 1.2 million people, mostly Sudanese, according to IOM.  Egypt is a major transit and destination point for migrants leaving hardship elsewhere in Africa, hosting nearly 9 million economic migrants. Egypt has been engaged in a prolonged dispute with Ethiopia over management of Nile River water access stemming from the construction of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), further adding to regional tensions.

Chad

More than 928,000 people, mostly Sudanese, have already crossed the border into Chad and tens of thousands more are expected as increasing lawlessness has been reported in Darfur. Chad had already been hosting almost 600,000 refugees, 400,000 of which are from Sudan’s Darfur region. In addition, Chad has almost 400,000 IDPs due to its own instability. With a long legacy of autocracy under Idriss Déby, Chad has faced perpetual instability. When Déby was killed in battle with an armed opposition group in 2021, the military bypassed the constitutionally mandated succession plan and installed his son, General Mahamat Idriss Déby, as president. Violent crackdowns against peaceful protesters calling for a restoration of constitutional order in October 2022 have generated another wave of refugees and internally displaced from this strategically important Sahelian country linking West, North, East, and Central Africa.

South Sudan

An estimated 677,000 South Sudanese refugees are reported to have crossed back into South Sudan, along with some Sudanese (211,000) and migrants and refugees from other countries (3,600). For most of its 10 years of existence, South Sudan has been in a civil war. More than a third of the population has been forcibly displaced—2 million as IDPs and 2.3 million as refugees. About 810,000 had fled to Sudan. Of the remaining 8.8 million South Sudanese in country, 7.1 million are facing acute food insecurity including 79,000 facing famine—virtually all of which is attributed to conflict. South Sudan remains in a state of persistent crisis.

Ethiopia

Host of the third largest community of refugees in the region (after Uganda and Chad) with more than 1 million, Ethiopia has since 2020 been embroiled in internal conflict, primarily involving the Tigray region, which borders Sudan. The number of internally displaced in Ethiopia is around 3.2 million, though accurate figures (particularly for the Tigray region) are not available. An estimated 15.8 million Ethiopians are facing acute food insecurity. Ethiopian refugees in neighboring countries total close to 150,000. This includes many Tigrayans who had fled to Sudan when the Ethiopian conflict started in November 2020. Since the escalation of fighting in Sudan, Ethiopian returnees comprise roughly 41 percent of the 159,000 people who have crossed into Ethiopia.

CAR

Some 30,000 Sudanese have fled to CAR. They were joined by more than 6,300 refugees from CAR who had previously escaped the fighting there. About 500,000 Central Africans are internally displaced and 750,000 have fled conflict into neighboring countries, including more than 24,000 into Sudan. Almost half of the population (some 3 million) of this sparsely populated country is facing acute food insecurity primarily due to conflict.

The United Nations Panel of Experts has found that the RSF is using CAR as a logistical hub for resupply and recruitment. Meanwhile, armed group activity within CAR has simultaneously increased.

Libya

Over 21,000 people, mostly Sudanese, have managed to cross the remote Libya border. Libya has long been a key transit country for migrants and refugees fleeing conflicts and repression from the western Sahel and other parts of Africa. An estimated 761,000 migrants are in Libya, many of whom are subject to abuse by human traffickers. Libya has also been facing an extended political conflict as militias linked to the eastern-based warlord, Khalifa Haftar, have repeatedly tried to undermine and overthrow the UN-backed government in Tripoli.

Eritrea

There are few, if any, Sudanese refugees fleeing to Eritrea, which is itself a major country of origin. Nevertheless, unconfirmed reports suggest that maybe as many as 3,500 Eritreans in Sudan were forcibly repatriated to Eritrea. More than 664,745 Eritreans have escaped the country of 3.7 million. Forced military conscription, arbitrary arrests, disappearances, and torture are among the many abuses against its citizens attributed to the Eritrean government by the UN. Eritrea was also a combatant in the neighboring Tigray region’s conflict with the government of Ethiopia.

Uganda

The spread of the Sudan conflict has also reached Uganda, with over 61,500 refugees from Sudan having arrived in Uganda since the start of the conflict. Sudanese make up the largest group of new arrivals in Uganda in 2024. Uganda already hosts the largest number of refugees (over 1.7 million) in Africa, due to the instability in South Sudan and the DRC.