Hospital attack kills 22 in southern Sudan as famine threatens war-torn Darfur region
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Famine is threatening many areas in Sudan’s war-torn western Darfur region, a global hunger watchdog said Thursday, as a military attack on a military hospital in the country’s south killed 22 people, including the hospital director and three medical staff.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been in the grip of military chaos after a power struggle erupted between the military and the powerful Rapid Support Forces, or RSF. The conflict has caused what the United Nations has called the world’s worst disaster.
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, or IPC, has released a new report that says acute malnutrition has reached famine levels in two other cities in Darfur. It stopped guaranteeing widespread hunger in the cities.
Last year, the group said that people in Darfur’s main town, El Fasher, which was overrun by the army after an 18-month siege, were facing starvation.
Thursday’s attack in the town of Kouik in South Kordofan state also left eight people wounded, according to the Sudan Doctors’ Network, a medical group that monitors the war. It was not yet clear how many civilians were killed.
WARNING: Video contains sad details | Thousands of people have tried to flee El Fasher in Sudan’s Darfur region after the town fell to the army during a violent siege.
The attack was “not just an incident, but part of a series of attacks that have hit South Kordofan,” the network said, adding that the attack left “several hospitals out of order.”
The UN estimates that more than 40,000 people have been killed in the war in Sudan, but aid organizations estimate that the true number may be many times higher. More than 14 million people have been forced to leave their homes.
Terrifying news
The IPC report said malnutrition levels of hunger have been registered in the towns of Umm Baru and Kernoi in North Darfur province. In November, the group said that along with El Fasher, the town of Kadugli in South Kordofan was also facing famine. At the same time, it also said that 20 other areas across Sudan are at risk of famine.
In Umm Baru, about 53 percent of children between the ages of six months and about five years are malnourished, the IPC said – almost double the rate of hunger, which stands at 30 percent. In Kernoi, 32 percent of children suffer from malnutrition, the group said.
“These alarming levels suggest an increased risk of excess mortality and raise concerns that nearby areas may experience similar catastrophic conditions,” the report said.
Since the civil war broke out in Sudan, the IPC has confirmed famine in a total of seven places. The group said it was unable to confirm absolute starvation in Umm Baru and Kernoi as access and lack of data made it difficult to confirm the other two parameters – food access and mortality – that need to be met to confirm starvation.
The fall of El Fasher in October 2025 in the RSF triggered an exodus of people to nearby towns, used up the resources of neighboring communities and increased food insecurity, the report said.
The IPC has confirmed famine only a few times, most recently in 2025 in northern Gaza during the Israel-Hamas war. It also confirmed famine in Somalia in 2011 and South Sudan in 2017 and 2020.
By 2024, famine had struck five other areas in North Darfur and Sudan’s Nuba Mountains region.
The IPC report also warned that many people could face severe hunger in Kordofan, where the conflict has disrupted food production and supply lines to besieged towns and isolated areas.
“Immediate and sustained action is essential to avoid deprivation, starvation, and death in the affected parts of Sudan,” the Rome-based group urged.
According to experts, hunger is determined in areas where deaths caused by malnutrition reach at least two people, or four children under five years of age, per 10,000 people; at least one in five people or households are severely food-deprived and face hunger; and at least 30 percent of children under the age of five suffer from severe malnutrition based on the weight-for-height ratio – or 15 percent based on upper arm measurements.
The fight continues
Since the RSF conquered El Fasher, which was one of the last strongholds of the army in Darfur, fighting has recently intensified in various parts of Kordofan. Recently, the Sudanese army started making gains in Kordofan after breaking the siege of Kadugli and the neighboring town of Dilling.
On Tuesday, the Sudanese army announced that it had opened a key road between Dilling and Kadugli, which had been under siege by the RSF since the start of the war. The RSF launched a drone attack on Tuesday that hit a medical center in Kadugli, killing 15 people, including seven children, according to the Sudan Doctors Network.
And this week, the United States and the UN said they want to mobilize international support to help Sudan, launching a new Sudan Humanitarian Fund with US $ 700 million in donations from the United Arab Emirates and the US.
The Trump administration said Tuesday it would inject $200 million into the program from a basket of $2 billion it set aside late last year to fund humanitarian projects around the world. The UAE has said it will contribute $500 million to the US. Saudi Arabia and several other stakeholders have promised to make pledges but have not specified amounts.
