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Sudan's war began a year ago. Children are among its most fragile survivors

Sudanese children suffering from malnutrition are treated at an MSF clinic in Metche Camp, Chad, near the Sudanese border, Saturday, April 6, 2024.  (AP Photo/Patricia Simon) Sudanese children suffering from malnutrition are treated at an MSF clinic in Metche Camp, Chad, near the Sudanese border, Saturday, April 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Patricia Simon)
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METCHE CAMP, Chad -

More than 16,000 children younger than 5 arriving in Chad from Sudan have had severe acute malnutrition, according to the UN — a stage where the effects of hunger are clearly visible.

Many people in this camp fled some of the conflict’s worst fighting in Sudan’s vast western region of Darfur. But the most desperate are trapped behind the front lines.

“We are seeing a catastrophe unfolding in North Darfur, where our teams have estimated that 13 children are dying each day of malnutrition and related health conditions at a camp for displaced people,” Avril Benoît, executive director of Doctors Without Borders in the U.S., said in a statement. She urged Sudanese authorities to stop blocking aid.

Some Sudanese manage to get help in time. One mother of six, Rachid Yaya Mohammed, said she came to the hospital at this camp in Chad because she is six months pregnant.

Two of her smallest children — twins — slept beside her.

Conditions are expected to worsen in the coming lean season between harvests, when food reserves are depleted and rains drive up rates of malaria.

Sudan plunged into chaos a year ago when clashes erupted in the capital, Khartoum, and spread.

In Darfur, brutal attacks by the Arab-dominated Rapid Support Forces on ethnic African civilians have revived memories of genocide.

Two decades ago, as many as 300,000 people were killed and 2.7 million were driven from their homes largely by government-backed Arab militias. The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces grew out of those militias known as the Janjaweed who were accused of widespread killings, rapes and other atrocities.

Now, prosecutors at the International Criminal Court say there are grounds to believe both sides in the current conflict are committing war crimes.

West Darfur, especially its capital city of Geneina, has witnessed some of the worst atrocities including mass killings and rampant sexual violence against the African Masalit tribe, according to UN experts. The AP has reported that militias launched waves of attacks on Geneina and other towns, taking men away and burning their homes.

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Associated Press writers Jessica Donati in Dakar, Senegal, and Samy Magdy in Cairo contributed to this report.

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