Sudan’s Humanitarian Crisis, Explained

The two warring parties were previously allies, having joined forces in 2019 to overthrow dictator Omar al-Bashir, who ruled for three decades before his ouster. The SAF’s leader, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, replaced him as de facto head of state. Burhan was backed by RSF General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, in orchestrating a second coup in 2021 that toppled Sudan’s interim government. But amid international pressure to transition to a civilian government, Burhan’s push to integrate the RSF into the national army triggered a violent revolt by Hemedti in mid-April 2023.

While there have been numerous temporary truces and humanitarian pauses throughout the conflict, international efforts to broker a permanent peace deal or establish a caretaker government have been unsuccessful. These have included negotiations led by the United States and Saudi Arabia that resulted in more than a dozen failed ceasefires, as well as peace plans proffered by the African Union and other regional blocs that ultimately collapsed. Meanwhile, the Sudanese government suspended its membership in the Intergovernmental Authority on Development—a bloc of East African countries—in 2024 over its outreach to RSF leader Hemedti. The government also restricted media access within Sudan. 

However, in November 2025, the RSF agreed to a proposal for a humanitarian ceasefire put forth by the United States and Arab countries and said it “looks forward” to peace talks. Yet neither the proposal nor any further talks came to fruition, and peace efforts remain stalled in 2026.

How bad is the humanitarian situation?

Three years into its civil war, Sudan is “defined by all the wrong superlatives: the largest displaced population, the most severe food insecurity crisis, and the single worst humanitarian disaster on earth,” Vigersky told CFR.

The country was already experiencing a grave humanitarian crisis before the conflict broke out, with nearly 16 million people facing severe food insecurity and an estimated 3.7 million internally displaced. The country was also hosting some 1.3 million refugees, mostly from South Sudan.

Yet the situation has grown even more grim since war broke out. More than two-thirds of the Sudanese population, an estimated 33.7 million, are in need of aid. Data is incomplete, and the UN figures on displacement vary, but according to the UN refugee agency’s Operational Data Portal as of April 2026, nearly twelve million people have been forcibly displaced. More than 6.8 million of them are internally displaced within Sudan, while close to 4.5 million are refugees, asylum seekers, and “returnees” who have fled or returned to neighboring countries. The number of people killed in the conflict is unknown due to restricted media access, but estimates range widely here too, from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of people.

The RSF’s capture of El Fasher in October 2025 consolidated the paramilitary group’s control over the entire Darfur region and sent tens of thousands more people fleeing the area. Humanitarian groups said the takeover involved mass killings of civilians, though the exact figure is unknown. The UN fact-finding mission found evidence of war crimes, including starvation and extermination. 

“We cannot allow Sudan to descend further into a nightmare of violence, hunger, and despair,” UN experts said in October. “The deliberate targeting of civilians, combined with the use of starvation, sexual violence, disappearance and displacement as weapons of war, is creating a humanitarian catastrophe of historic proportions.”

The conflict has also destroyed much of Sudan’s infrastructure. Air strikes and shelling have hit hospitals, prisons, schools, and other facilities in dense residential areas. The health-care system has essentially collapsed, with 70 percent of facilities in conflict zones defunct. Disease is particularly acute, and health authorities have reported that outbreaks—including of cholera, dengue fever, and malaria—are increasing as a result of disruptions to basic public health services. 

At the same time, rising food and fuel costs are exacerbating food insecurity, with more than nineteen million people facing acute hunger and famine conditions confirmed in two regions of the country—with an additional twenty areas at risk. The World Food Program (WFP) has warned that without a cessation of hostilities, Sudan risks becoming “the world’s largest hunger crisis in recent history.” 

Both the SAF and RSF have been accused of war crimes, leading the International Criminal Court to open an investigation. The United States announced in January 2025 it had determined the RSF had committed genocide in Darfur. It subsequently sanctioned Hemedti as well as seven RSF-owned companies in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Trump administration has also condemned the violence in Sudan and sanctioned RSF commanders for their involvement in the assault on El Fasher.

Where are refugees going?

More than 918,000 people have headed west to Chad. Another roughly 865,000 refugees are South Sudanese who had previously fled to Sudan and have since returned to their home country due to the war. The remaining refugees have fled to the Central African Republic, Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya, and Uganda, adding to the sizable refugee and internally displaced populations in those countries.

Most refugees are women and children, who are more vulnerable to sexual assault and gender-based violence. There have also been reports of ethnically driven mass killings and weaponization of sexual violence against the Masalit people, particularly in the West Darfur city of El Geneina. 

How are neighboring countries handling the conflict spillover?

Many of Sudan’s neighbors are struggling to handle the influx of refugees while addressing their own domestic challenges. Five of the seven countries bordering Sudan have suffered internal conflict in recent years, and refugees who previously fled violence and famine in Ethiopia and South Sudan are now returning to their home countries alongside Sudanese nationals. 

UN experts say Sudan’s neighbors are in urgent need of more assistance. This includes the Central African Republic, as its own internal conflict has rendered it ill-equipped to handle incoming refugee flows, and Chad, which closed its land border with Sudan immediately after fighting broke out but continues to aid refugees who make it across. 

However, Chad itself is in need of significant humanitarian assistance, facing severe food insecurity and health emergencies, both exacerbated by regional instability and climate change. In 2024, the Adré border crossing in eastern Chad was reopened to facilitate the delivery of aid to Sudan’s Darfur region, and then closed again in February 2026. 

While Egypt’s border remains open, crossings are often delayed, and migrants there face immense challenges that reportedly include threats of deportation and mass arbitrary detentions.

How have other countries gotten involved?

Concerns over foreign influence have grown as the fighting has escalated. “This conflict has been enabled by external powers who continue to provide arms and financing” to both the RSF and the SAF, said Michelle Gavin, CFR senior fellow for Africa policy studies.

Egypt has close ties to the SAF, while Russia-backed Libyan warlord Khalifa Haftar has sent military supplies to the RSF. Russian state news reported in February 2025 that Sudan’s foreign minister had confirmed the country had reached a deal allowing Russia to establish a naval base on Sudan’s Red Sea coast. There were also reports in February 2026 of Ethiopia hosting camps to train RSF soldiers. The Sudanese army and U.S. lawmakers have long publicly accused the UAE of providing military supplies to the RSF, which Abu Dhabi has denied. (The Wall Street Journal reported in October 2025 that the UAE had increased its arm deliveries to the RSF in recent months.)

The crisis has also presented a looming threat to regional economic cooperation on Nile River water resources and several major oil pipelines that cross through Sudan. Climate change has contributed to devastating drought and floods, which have heightened migrant displacement and stifled access to natural resources. The country’s ports along the Red Sea are also at risk due to attacks on vessels by the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. The SAF has reportedly benefited from using Iranian drones, though both Tehran and Khartoum deny having any direct connection. 

Several countries in the Horn of Africa and Sahel regions—including Chad, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Kenya, and South Sudan—have participated in peace talks in the hope of stemming these issues, largely to no avail.

The complicity of other African countries highlights the influence that external powers like the UAE exert on Sudan’s neighbors, Gavin wrote. While ascertaining the degree to which “Emirati largesse” affected these countries’ positions proves challenging, the war’s costs “will not be contained by Sudan’s borders,” she added.

What have international organizations done?

A constellation of agencies, funds, and programs, collectively known as a UN Country Team, has been in Sudan for years. In 2024, the United Nations and its humanitarian partners provided $1.8 billion in support to nearly sixteen million people in Sudan. Several other organizations, including the International Committee of the Red Cross and various Islamic relief agencies, are also supplying aid, augmenting the work being carried out by local Sudanese aid groups.

Despite their efforts, the conflict has forced the United Nations and aid organizations to temporarily halt or scale back in-country operations. The WFP has struggled to deliver shipments in places that were previously aid hubs, such as the capital city of Wad Madani in Gezira state, which fell to the RSF in 2023. Other organizations, such as the International Rescue Committee, have found it difficult to reach those in need in areas that are experiencing heavy fighting, such as the city of El Fasher in North Darfur—well before it was overtaken by the RSF. 

Meanwhile, funding shortfalls persist. The United Nations’ 2026 humanitarian response appeal for roughly $2.8 billion worth of aid for Sudan is only about 17 percent funded. Previous annual  appeals fell far short of the amounts requested, too. The situation has grown more dire since the start of 2025 amid global aid reductions, including the Trump’s administration’s cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development, which had been critical in providing billions of dollars of humanitarian aid to Sudan.

International donors and world leaders will gather in Berlin on the anniversary of the war tomorrow to discuss aid for Sudan, though experts are skeptical the meeting will result in significant action. Ultimately, humanitarian response efforts require more robust funding, against a backdrop of aid reaching new lows, Vigersky said. 

“The pieces are there to scale up, from the community kitchens to the exceptional leadership across the UN country team,” he added. Yet, “the attention economy is unkind to multiyear crises like Sudan. Heading into year four, the crisis is increasingly abandoned by the international community.”