Humanitarian organizations in Chad urgently need more funding to respond to refugees and returnees from Sudan

N’Djamena 19 May - As a result of renewed fighting in West Darfur approximately 30,000 refugees and returnees have crossed the border into Chad during the last week. In total, about 80,000 people (refugees and returnees) have fled Sudan to Chad since the outbreak of conflict in Khartoum on 15 April. Humanitarian agencies in Chad are working closely with the Chadian government to scale up the response to this mounting humanitarian crisis.

The vast majority of the refugees and returnees are women and children, and most are still living in precarious conditions close to the border where the security situation is unpredictable. A relocation operation by the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) has started to move refugees away from the border to existing refugee sites.

The UN Migration Agency, (IOM) is assisting returning Chadian migrants to settle in sites away from the border as well. Agencies are facing huge logistical challenges, shortage of funds and are working around the clock to move as many people as possible before the onset of the rainy season in a matter of dates which will make the roads impassable. The recent upsurge in fighting makes it even more urgent to relocate those currently near the border to ensure their safety.

“Interacting with refugees and returnees at the border in Koufroun today highlighted the urgency to scale up the response. Even if they have sought refuge within Chad, they are not safe until they are relocated away from the border. The unfortunate loss of life of a refugee woman yesterday, 200 meters within the Chadian territory, after being hit by fire from the Sudanese side makes the relocation an imperative priority.” – said Ms Violet Kakyomya, Humanitarian Coordinator.

So far humanitarian agencies have provided shelter, distributed household items kits and given emergency food assistance. One in five children between the ages of six and 59 months are acutely malnourished and urgently require nutritional support. UN agencies and NGOs have set up mobile health clinics to provide tailored consultations for nutrition as well as reproductive health, vaccinations and mental health support. However, this assistance is still limited and has only reached a small fraction of those in need.

Chad already hosts about 600,000 refugees, the largest refugee population in west and central Africa, including 400,000 Sudanese refugees. The extraordinary hospitality of the Chadian government and its people has been demonstrated yet again in this crisis. The joint effort of the government and the humanitarian community has been significant in the acute emergency period, but the scale of this crisis requires more funding to save lives.

The humanitarian community in Chad has developed under the coordination of UNHCR, an interagency response plan which requires $129 million to respond to the projected needs of 135,000 people over the next six months. However, only 21 per cent of funding has been committed at this time.

Before this crisis, the government of Chad and its humanitarian partners launched the Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) for 2023 for $670 million to respond to humanitarian needs country wide. The plan has only received 8 per cent of its financial requirements thus far.

For more information, please contact : M. Damian Lilly, Deputy Head of Office, OCHA, lilly@un.org ; +235 69 34 95 64

Mme. Fragkiska Megaloudi, Public Information Officer, OCHA, fragkiska.megaloudi@un.org ; +235 68 00 08 41 M. Pascal Dohou Ferso, Press Officer, Coordination Résidente ; pascal.dohou@un.org; +235 66 66 16 71