World Food Programme Fighting Hunger Worldwide

The World Food Programme on Friday urged Sudanese authorities to allow the UN agency full access in the troubled states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile. "We do not have access to those two places ... and are very preoccupied of the situation there," a WFP spokeswoman told reporters, explaining that at least 235,000 people were in need of assistance in both areas.

While the UN World Food Programme has received requests from groups such as the Sudanese Red Crescent Society for aid, “due to government-imposed restrictions on pre-positioning of food stocks in Blue Nile, WFP has only enough stocks to feed 20,000 people for two weeks,” it said.

Fighting between the Sudanese armed forces and rebels in the country’s Blue Nile state has continued, displacing tens of thousands of people who cannot be reached by relief agencies due to movement restrictions imposed by the Government, the United Nations humanitarian office reported today. (..) The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has received official requests from SRCS and another local group for food assistance to communities displaced from Blue Nile.

United Nations agencies are mobilizing to assist at some 20,000 people who have fled the fighting in Sudan’s Blue Nile state and arrived in neighbouring Ethiopia. (..) In addition, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is providing water bladders and medical supplies while the UN World Food Programme (WFP) is sending food urgently to the area.

Armed conflict and air raids, blocked humanitarian aid and potential food shortages: conditions for civilians in two states on the border with South Sudan are giving increasing cause for concern. (..) The World Food Programme (WFP) said it had 140MT of food in Blue Nile, enough to feed 20,000 for two weeks. “There is no chance of restocking for the moment,” WFP spokesman Amor Almagro told IRIN in Khartoum.

In their hundreds of thousands they have crossed the border, arriving by boat, bus or on foot. (..) At the receiving end, in Juba and other towns across the south, a massive emergency programme was rolled out by the World Food Programme and other non-government organisations to supply returnees with basic items like food, cooking utensils and soap.

As Amger Ngor fled the fighting in Abyei six weeks ago she left everything: her little shop with its generator, her television, fridge, furniture, clothes, a child’s bike. It was just like three years earlier, she said, but worse. (..) His home now is with more than 1,000 others on a patch of cleared land outside the town of Wau where they rely on handouts from the World Food Program and assistance from aid agencies (..).

South Sudan will split with the rest of Sudan on Saturday to become the newest nation in the world (..). The recent fighting in Abyei has displaced an estimated 100,000 people, who rely on the World Food Programme for assistance. WFP also had been distributing food to an estimated 900,000 people in the south. Emilia Casella, a spokesperson for WFP, said the food agency welcomes South Sudan's independence.

North Sudan said on Tuesday it wanted U.N. peacekeepers to leave when the south secedes on July 9, shrugging off international pressure to extend the mission to protect civilians caught up in fresh fighting. (..) North Sudan's Darfur region, the scene of an eight-year insurgency, is monitored by a separate joint U.N./African Union (UNAMID) peacekeeping force that does not have the same deadline. Individual U.N. missions, including UNICEF and the World Food Program would also not be affected.

Four days before South Sudan becomes independent from the rest of Sudan, the United Nations is preparing for the next phase of its role in the region, both on the ground and at Headquarters in New York with the potential addition of a new Member State. (..) Emilia Casella, a spokesperson for WFP, said the agency welcomed South Sudan’s independence, “as peace is important to maintaining food security.”