Humanitarian flight ban in West Darfur restricting relief assistance, UN says
25 February 2008 - Tens of thousands of Darfurians living in the west of the war-wracked Sudanese region are without access to
humanitarian aid because of the continuing ban on relief flights to the area, the United Nations reported today.
The prohibition on all such flights to the north of West Darfur's state capital, El Geneina, has remained in place over
the last week, UN spokesperson Michele Montas told journalists.
West Darfur has been the scene of the conflict's most intense fighting in recent months, and UN officials estimate that
three quarters of the 80,000 civilians who have become displaced across Darfur since the start of this year come from
that state.
Yesterday the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, Ameerah Haq, and the Joint Special Representative for the UN-African
Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur (UNAMID), Rodolphe Adada, issued a joint statement voicing grave concern for the
safety of civilians in West Darfur's Jebel Muun, which has reportedly been subject to aerial bombing in recent days.
Ms. Haq and Mr. Adada appealed for an immediate end to the fighting and stressed that "the solution to Darfur's problems
can never be a military one."
More than 200,000 people have been killed and at least 2.2 million others displaced since 2003 because of fighting
between rebels, Government forces and allied militia known as the Janjaweed. UNAMID was deployed at the start of this
year to try to quell the violence and suffering.
Ms. Montas warned today that Darfurians are also facing food insecurity in some areas because of bad crops which, in
combination with the harassment by militiamen, is spurring major population movements towards the camps housing
internally displaced persons (IDPs).
ENDS