On April 15th, 2024, we will mark one year since the onset of conflict in Sudan. The fighting has displaced more than eight and a half billion[1] people. Eighteen million children, women, and men in Sudan face acute food insecurity, with the UN warning that the country is on the brink of famine. Humanitarian organizations estimate that without a significant influx of aid, 220,000 children could die from malnutrition in the coming months.
And yet, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) are routinely blocking the delivery of humanitarian assistance that could save lives and alleviate suffering, and looting the aid that does make it into Sudan. And both the SAF and RSF have carried out war crimes including rapes, torture, extrajudicial killings, and other human rights abuses, deepening the suffering of Sudanese families, driving more people from their homes. Those atrocities continue, fueled by outside powers who provide weapons and fan the flames of violence.
Today, I want to speak directly to the Sudanese people about what the United States is doing to help alleviate the suffering of civilians, to end the war, to put the future of Sudan back into the hands of its citizens.
We will continue to provide robust humanitarian aid to help your families and communities. Last year, the United States was the largest provider of assistance to Sudan, and we'll announce more support in the coming days. With the UN emergency appeal for Sudan only 5 percent funded, we know America can't do it alone. So we're pressing on other donor countries to do much more. We'll coordinate greater international pressure on the warring parties to grant unobstructed humanitarian access to you, and people across Sudan, as the UN Security Council has demanded.
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We'll enhance efforts to hold accountable the perpetrators of war crimes and other atrocities in the RSF and the SAF, including through strengthening sanctions the United States has placed on the individuals, institutions, and other entities responsible for abuses and for fueling the conflict.
Finally, we'll keep working with key partners, particularly Africans and regional countries, to press the warring parties to lay down their arms and resume peace talks, because more fighting cannot, and will not, end this conflict.
The world has not forgotten the inspiring transformation that the people of Sudan were leading before the fighting broke out - a transition to peace, to democracy, to justice. We know that the overwhelming majority of you want to return to that transition and complete it, as is your right. We'll work tirelessly with you, with all our partners, until Sudan is finally led by, and accountable to, the civilians of your great nation.
[i] million
