STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
A paramilitary group in Sudan has been firing artillery shells into the country's largest refugee camp. What? The group is fighting a civil war against Sudan's army. OK, but now they are also blasting this refugee camp, where people were already starving. And the shelling has killed about 80 people, forcing others to flee. NPR's Emmanuel Akinwotu has been following all of this. Welcome, sir.
EMMANUEL AKINWOTU, BYLINE: Good morning.
INSKEEP: Why would the paramilitary group do this?
AKINWOTU: Well, the official line is that they're not doing it. But at the same time, people close to the RSF or supporting them have been justifying this by saying that armed groups aligned with the army are in there. And even if that were true, to strike at a refugee camp would - is a shocking development and would be illegal. This paramilitary group in question is the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF. And according to local reports, according to refugees and NGOs at the camp like Doctors Without Borders, they have been striking the camp with artillery for the last two weeks. RSF used to partner with the army. Now they're at war, and they've been at war for the last 20 months. And this camp's called Zamzam, and it's located in the western region of Darfur, where there was a genocide 20 years ago.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
AKINWOTU: And the situation there, as you can imagine, has become dire.
INSKEEP: OK, when you put the camp in Darfur, I begin to get some idea of it. But who's living there?
AKINWOTU: Well, for decades, it's been this place where hundreds of thousands of people have resided there who fled the genocide. It holds people who fled the genocide 20 years ago and people who've fled recent waves of violence since then. But that violence has gotten worse since the war started. The RSF control most of Darfur now. Nathan Raymond is the executive director at Yale University's Humanitarian Research Lab. And he has a team that's been monitoring this via satellite imagery.
NATHAN RAYMOND: Zamzam is in a posture that we call a kill box. The RSF largely has these people surrounded.
AKINWOTU: So basically, the entire region around this camp is under siege, and at least hundreds of people there are just trying to escape.
INSKEEP: OK. So if you're a refugee and in a refugee camp that has become a kill box, where do you flee to?
AKINWOTU: Well, they're trying to escape to towns that are some distance away, most by donkey carts or on foot, essentially in desertlike areas where they're likely to be more vulnerable. Their fear is that if they aren't attacked on the road, they could die of starvation. I spoke to Melanie Kempster. She's the global director of health and nutrition at Relief International, which has a presence in the camp.
MELANIE KEMPSTER: The rate of malnourished children that we're seeing in Zamzam is so alarming. More than 1 in 3 children that we're screening are malnourished. And it's not just small numbers either. We're talking about screening thousands of children.
AKINWOTU: It's important to remember the camp is the only site in the world currently where famine has been officially declared, and there are reports of people resorting to eat grass, even animal fodder.
INSKEEP: Is the rest of the world saying anything about this?
AKINWOTU: Well, the outgoing U.S. envoy to Sudan, Tom Perello, condemned the attacks by the RSF yesterday. And he also urged armed groups aligned with the army not to put the camp at risk. NGOs and experts there say that even if those armed actors are there, to do this is an incredibly shocking development that needs to stop.
INSKEEP: NPR's Emmanuel Akinwotu reporting from Lagos, Nigeria, thanks very much for your insights.
AKINWOTU: Thank you.
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