UNICEF launches $110m appeal for Sudan children

Sudanese girls sit in a classroom at the El-Riyadh camp for internally displaced people in Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state on February 8, 2017. AFP PHOTO | ASHRAF SHAZLY

What you need to know:

  • Around three million children remain out of school, with half of them living in conflict affected areas.
  • Agency says two million children under five in the country are acutely malnourished.

KHARTOUM

The UN children's agency on Wednesday launched a $110 million appeal to help two million acutely malnourished children across Sudan, including hundreds of thousands living in conflict areas.

UNICEF said Sudan is home to around 13 per cent of all children suffering from acute malnutrition across Africa.

Their situation is exacerbated by conflict-related displacements, El Nino, epidemics, floods and droughts.

"The United Nations Children's Fund in Sudan launches an appeal in response to children's needs across the country, for a provisional total of $110 million," UNICEF said in a statement.

The agency said two million children under five in Sudan are acutely malnourished.

And two million children have been displaced due to violence in Darfur, the regions of South and North Kordofan, Blue Nile and Abyei, with many separated from their relatives and affected by grave violations, it said.

Around three million children remain out of school, with half of them living in conflict affected areas.

Although Sudan has made progress across many life-saving sectors in recent years, around 24 million people still lack proper sanitation facilities while six million children have no access to clean drinking water, the agency said.

UNICEF has spent about $500 million in Sudan over the past five years, and the agency increasingly aims to tap funds from inside Sudan.