CAIRO (AP) — Famine is spreading in Sudan’s war-torn western Darfur region and has now engulfed two more towns there, the Global Hunger Monitor said Thursday. The announcement came after the group said last year that people in Darfur’s main city of El Fasher, occupied by paramilitary forces after an 18-month siege, were suffering from famine.
Much of Sudan has been mired in war since April 2023 due to a power struggle between the East African country’s military and the powerful paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The conflict has triggered what the United Nations calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report on the spread of famine comes as MSF launched an attack on a military hospital in southern Sudan on Thursday that killed 22 people, including the hospital’s medical director and three other medical staff.
The attack in the town of Kuik in South Kordofan province also wounded eight people, the Sudanese Doctors Network said, a group of medical professionals who track the war said. It was unclear how many of the casualties were civilians.
The network said in a statement that the attack was “not an isolated incident but part of a series of attacks plaguing South Kordofan” and had left “several hospitals inoperable”.
The United Nations estimates more than 40,000 people have been killed in Sudan’s war, but aid agencies believe the true number is likely many times higher. More than 14 million people have been forced to flee their homes.
a harrowing report
The IPC reports that famine has now been detected in the Darfur towns of Um Baru and Kernoi. In November, the group said the region’s main city of El Fasher and the city of Kadugli in South Kordofan state were suffering from famine. At the time, the organization also said that 20 other regions in Sudan were also at risk of famine.
In Umbaru, nearly 53% of children between 6 months and almost 5 years old suffer from acute malnutrition, while 32% of children in Kernoi also face the same challenge.
“These alarming rates indicate an increased risk of excess mortality and raise concerns that nearby areas may be experiencing similar catastrophic conditions,” the report said.
The report states that El Fasher fell to RSF in October 2025, causing a large number of people to flee to nearby towns, straining resources in neighboring communities and increasing food insecurity rates.
The IPC has only confirmed a few famines, most recently in northern Gaza in 2025 during the Israel-Hamas war. It also confirmed famines in Somalia in 2011, South Sudan in 2017 and 2020.
With the release of this report, the total number of famine areas in Sudan has increased to nine. Famine also hit five other regions in North Darfur in 2024, as well as Sudan’s Nuba Mountains.
Fighting has recently focused on the Kordofan region after MSF forces captured El Fasher, one of the group’s last strongholds in Darfur. However, Sudanese forces have since made advances in Kordofan by breaking the siege of Kadugli and the neighboring town of Dirin.
The IPC report also warned that more people may face extreme hunger in Kordofan state, where conflict has disrupted food production and supply lines in besieged towns and remote areas.
“An immediate and sustained ceasefire is vital to avoid further poverty, hunger and death in affected areas of Sudan,” the Rome-based group pleaded.
Experts say a famine is defined when at least 2 people or 4 children under the age of 5 die from malnutrition-related causes in an area per 10,000 people; at least one in five people or families are severely lacking in food and face hunger; at least 30% of children under the age of 5 suffer from acute malnutrition based on weight and height measurements, and 15% of children under the age of 5 suffer from acute malnutrition based on upper arm circumference measurements.
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Associated Press writer Fay Abuelgasim in Cairo contributed to this report.
