Cape Town — The Trump administration is canceling humanitarian aid programs it previously identified as lifesaving, according to an internal State Department email obtained by The Atlantic.

The new round of cuts will reportedly end all U.S. humanitarian funding in seven African countries — Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Malawi, Mali, Niger, Somalia, and Zimbabwe — in what officials describe as a "responsible exit". Nine other nations, including Ethiopia, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, are facing redirected funding under a reworked arrangement with the United Nations.

Unlike earlier cuts to Afghanistan and Yemen, which the administration justified by citing terrorist diversion of resources, the email offers a different rationale for the latest cancellations, saying there is "no strong nexus between the humanitarian response and U.S. national interests."

The scale of need in the affected countries is significant. Across the seven nations losing all U.S. aid, at least 6.2 million people are facing "extreme or catastrophic conditions", according to the UN.

The State Department said it is "responsibly moving programming onto new mechanisms", but aid organizations believe replacement funding remains uncertain.