UN human rights chief to visit Sudan on Wednesday

GENEVA

UN human rights chief Volker Turk will visit Sudan on Wednesday for the first time since 2022, the UN human rights office said Monday.

Turk is scheduled to meet authorities, civil society representatives and the UN country team in Port Sudan, according to a statement.

Since April 2023, fighting between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces has killed tens of thousands of people and forced an estimated 13.6 million from their homes, triggering what the UN has described as one of the world’s most severe humanitarian crises.

During the visit, Turk will also travel to Sudan’s Northern State, which has received tens of thousands of people displaced by violence in Darfur and Kordofan.

There, he is set to visit the Al Afad gathering site, which hosts a growing number of internally displaced people, particularly those fleeing El-Fasher. The city fell to the Rapid Support Forces in October and has since been the scene of reported massacres.

Al Afad began receiving displaced families last October and now hosts around 24,000 people, with an average of 35 to 40 new families arriving each day, according to the Sudanese American Physicians Association.

The visit is scheduled to continue through Sunday.