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☆ Food Aid for Sudanese Refugees in Chad Could End Next Month, WFP Says
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-12 | by ( March | At A.M. | ) www.usnews.com time to read: +1 min

GENEVA (Reuters) - Food aid for hundreds of thousands of Sudanese refugees in Chad, some of whom are close to starvation, will be suspended next month without more funding, the World Food Programme (WFP) said on Tuesday. But the WFP says it is struggling to feed them all and many are already skipping meals. Nearly half of Sudanese refugee children under five-years-old are suffering from severe anemia. A supply route from Chad into Sudan's Darfur, where hunger is worsening, is also at risk due to funding shortages, WFP said. With more resources, WFP would be able to position food stocks ahead of the rainy season when some refugee populations in Chad get cut off from supplies by muddy rivers.

Persons: Pierre Honnorat, Emma Farge, Angus MacSwan Organizations: Food Programme, WFP's Locations: GENEVA, Chad, Sudan, Chad into Sudan's Darfur

CAIRO (AP) — The U.N. food agency said Friday it has received reports of people dying from starvation in Sudan, where raging fighting between rival generals is hampering the distribution of aid and food supplies to those most hungry. The conflict erupted last April in the capital, Khartoum, and quickly spread to other areas of the country, after months of simmering tensions between the two forces. World Food Program said that some 18 million people across Sudan currently face acute hunger, with the most desperate trapped behind the front lines of the conflict. Photos You Should See View All 45 Images"Life-saving assistance is not reaching those who need it the most, and we are already receiving reports of people dying of starvation,” said Eddie Rowe, WFP's director for Sudan. Burhan and Dagalo are yet to meet in person since the conflict began.

Persons: Abdel Fattah Burhan, Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, ”, Eddie Rowe, Burhan Organizations: Sudanese, Rapid Support Forces, Food Program, The United Nations Locations: CAIRO, Sudan, Africa, Khartoum, Darfur, Kordofan, Gezira, Sudan’s, Saudi Arabia, United States

☆ Live updates: Israel-Hamas war, Gaza airstrikes, IDF offensive
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-02 | by ( Chris Lau | Andrew Raine | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +1 min

Samir Hussein/WireImage/Getty ImagesAcclaimed artist Abel "The Weeknd" Tesfaye is providing four million meals to the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to help people in Gaza, the UN's body has said. Tesfaye, who is a UN Goodwill Ambassador, has directed $2.5 million from his XO Humanitarian Fund towards WFP humanitarian efforts in Gaza, according to WFP's statement Friday. The WFP didn't indicate when the aid could reach Gaza. His XO Humanitarian Fund, which was established in partnership with WFP USA in 2022, has raised $5 million to date. The first $2.5 million of the fund went to support emergency food assistance to women and children in Ethiopia, and the rest will be allocated to the Gaza response, according to the statement.

Persons: Samir Hussein, Abel, Tesfaye, Corrine Fleisher, ” Organizations: United Nations, Food Programme, UN Goodwill, Fund, USA Locations: London, Gaza, Ethiopia

The second senior EU official confirmed that. A third source, also an EU official, said the Commission was "cooperating actively with WFP to resolve systemic defects" but said no aid was suspended at this stage. Last year, it contributed more than half of the $2.2 billion of funding that went to the humanitarian response there. The U.N. report did not attempt to quantify the amount of aid that was diverted but said its findings "suggest that post-delivery aid diversion in Somalia is widespread and systemic". In all, investigators collected data from 55 IDP sites in Somalia and found aid diversion in all of them, the report said.

Persons: Ayenat, Balazs Ujvari, Antonio Guterres, Devex, Jessica Jennings, gatekeepers, Gabriela Baczynska, Michelle Nichols, Aaron Ross, Emma Farge, Daphne Psaledakis, Joe Bavier, Howard Goller Organizations: REUTERS, UNITED NATIONS, European Union, Food Programme, Reuters, European Commission, EU, WFP, U.N, U.S . Agency for International Development, USAID, European, Somali Disaster Management Office, United Nations, Thomson Locations: Dollow, Somalia, NAIROBI, GENEVA, Ethiopia, United States, Nairobi, Geneva

☆ UN food aid deliveries by AI robots could begin next year
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-07 | by ( Emma Farge | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

GENEVA, July 7 (Reuters) - AI-powered robotic vehicles could deliver food parcels to conflict and disaster zones by as early as next year in a move aimed to spare the lives of humanitarian workers, a World Food Programme (WFP) official told Reuters. Attacks against aid workers have intensified in recent years amid the highest number of violent conflicts since World War Two, according to the United Nations. WFP, the U.N.'s food aid agency, alone lost three workers earlier this year in Sudan's conflict. They were first conceived during the battle for Syria's Aleppo, between 2012 and 2016, when humanitarian workers struggled to get aid to besieged parts of the city, Kowatsch said. AI is used to combine data gleaned from various sources including satellite and sensors, allowing remote drivers to steer the vehicles.

Persons: Bernhard Kowatsch, Kowatsch, Emma Farge, Frank Jack Daniel Our Organizations: Food Programme, Reuters, United Nations, WFP, International Telecommunication Union, Air, Emergency, German Aerospace Center, Thomson Locations: GENEVA, Geneva, Aleppo, Syria, Sudan, South Sudan

[1/2] Hsiao-Wei Lee, Afghanistan country director for World Food Programme (WFP), speaks during an interview with Reuters in Kabul, Afghanistan, March 20, 2023. "It's five million people we are able to serve for another couple of months but then beyond that we don't have the resources," WFP Afghanistan Country Director Hsiao-Wei Lee told Reuters. Around 15 million Afghans in danger from lack of food are in need of assistance, according to WFP. WFP needs $1 billion in funding to provide food aid and carry out planned projects between now until March, Lee said. WFP would stay in Afghanistan and carry out its other work such as nutrition projects, Lee said, even if the projected cuts took place.

Persons: Hsiao, Wei Lee, Sayed, Lee, it's, Charlotte Greenfield, Andrew Mills, Aurora Ellis Organizations: Food Programme, Reuters, REUTERS, United Nations, WFP, Afghanistan, Thomson Locations: Afghanistan, Kabul, Islamabad, Doha

[1/2] Internally displaced Ethiopians queue to receive food aid in the Higlo camp for people displaced by drought in the town of Gode, Somali Region, Ethiopia, April 26, 2022. REUTERS/Tiksa Negeri/File PhotoNAIROBI, June 19 (Reuters) - The U.N. World Food Programme hopes to resume some food aid distribution in Ethiopia as soon as next month once it has received greater control over how beneficiaries are selected, a senior WFP official said on Monday. It paused food aid to the northern Tigray region in May and then to all of Ethiopia this month in response to widespread theft of donations. The WFP has been providing emergency food assistance to nearly 6 million of them. Valerie Guarnieri, WFP assistant executive director for programme and policy development, said the agency wanted to reduce the authority of local and regional government officials to decide who qualified for food aid.

Persons: Valerie Guarnieri, Guarnieri, Aaron Ross, Alison Williams Organizations: REUTERS, Tiksa, WFP, Reuters, U.S . Agency for International Development, USAID, Ethiopian, Thomson Locations: Gode, Somali Region, Ethiopia, NAIROBI, Tigray, States

☆ No Black Sea grain deal ships inspected as Russian deadline looms
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-09 | by ( Michelle Nichols | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

WASHINGTON, May 8 (Reuters) - The United Nations said no ships were inspected on Sunday or Monday under a deal allowing the safe Black Sea export of Ukraine grain, which Moscow has threatened to quit on May 18 over obstacles to its own grain and fertilizer exports. The U.N. and Turkey brokered the Black Sea export agreement in July last year to help tackle a global food crisis that has been worsened by Moscow's war in Ukraine. Officials from Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the U.N. make up a Joint Coordination Centre (JCC) in Istanbul, which implements the deal. To help convince Russia to allow Ukraine to resume Black Sea grain exports, a three-year pact was also struck in July 2022 in which the U.N. agreed to help Moscow facilitate those shipments. The Black Sea export deal also provided for the export of fertilizer, including ammonia, but there had been no such exports so far, the United Nations said.

☆ Sudan military faction chiefs agree May 4-11 truce in princple -South Sudan
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Mohamed Noureldin | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

The credibility of the reported May 4-11 deal ceasefire deal between Sudanese army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and paramilitary Rapid Support forces (RSF) leader General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo was unclear, given the rampant violations that undermined previous agreements running from 24 to 72 hours. "The entire region could be affected," he said in an interview with a Japanese newspaper on Tuesday as an envoy from Sudan's army chief, who leads one of the warring sides, met Egyptian officials in Cairo. United Nations officials had said U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths aimed to visit Sudan on Tuesday but the timing was still to be confirmed. "The risk is that this is not just going to be a Sudan crisis, it's going to be a regional crisis," said Michael Dunford, the WFP's East Africa director. That has raised the spectre of a prolonged conflict that could draw in outside powers.

☆ In flight from Sudan, refugees in Chad give birth alone without shelter
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( Mahamat Ramadane | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

KOUFROUN, Chad, May 1 (Reuters) - At a refugee camp in remote eastern Chad, Amné Moustapha is close to giving birth. But many of the countries hosting new arrivals, including Chad, face their own problems including food shortages, drought and high prices, creating a humanitarian crisis beyond Sudan's borders that international agencies are struggling to contain. I hear that there are midwives but since we took refuge here several women have given birth without medical assistance. Her husband said that eight other women had given birth without help in the camp in Koufroun, where temperatures soar to 45 degrees Celsius (113 degrees Fahrenheit). "Several women have given birth here but have no shelter," said Moustapha's husband Khamis Asseid Ahmat Haron beside the unfinished stick frame of their new home.

☆ World Food Programme halts Sudan operations, 3 workers killed
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

CAIRO,April 16 (Reuters) - The United Nations' World Food Programme (WFP) said on Sunday it had temporarily halted all operations in Sudan after three of its employees were killed in clashes between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) a day earlier. "While we review the evolving security situation, we are forced to temporarily halt all operations in Sudan," WFP executive director Cindy McCain said in a statement. The incident has seriously impacted the organisation's ability to move humanitarian workers and aid in Sudan, he said. Earlier on Sunday, the United Nations condemned the killing of the WFP employees, saying they died while carrying out their duties. The fighting broke out on Saturday between army units loyal to General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), led by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti.

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