Rescue Efforts Continue in Western Sudan Village Wiped Out by Landslide

By Staff, Agencies

Rescue efforts continue in the western Sudanese village of Tarseen after an armed group that controls the area appealed for foreign help in recovering bodies and rescuing residents from torrential rain that wiped the village.

A video by the Sudan Liberation Movement Army showed the affected site and people gathering at a terrain in the village as rescue efforts took place.

SLM/A, which has long controlled and governed an autonomous portion of Jebel Marra, appealed to the United Nations and international aid agencies to help collect the bodies of victims, including men, women and children.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Sudan said that while local reports estimated the death toll at 1,000, humanitarian partners have reported that the number could be significantly lower.

"An inter-agency assessment will seek to provide verified figures in the coming days," OCHA said.

Arjimand Hussain, regional response manager for the development group Plan International, said the last 45 km of the route to Tarseen were impassable to motor vehicles and could only be reached on foot or by donkey.

Nine bodies were recovered by volunteers, said Abdelhafiz Ali from the Jebel Marra Emergency Room, who noted that the village had hosted hundreds of people displaced by fighting.

The SLM/A has remained neutral in the battle between the main enemies in Sudan's war, the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

The two foes are fighting over control of al-Fashir, capital of North Darfur state, which is under siege from the RSF and has suffered famine.

Residents of al-Fashir and nearby areas have sought shelter in Jebel Marra, though food, shelter, and medical supplies are insufficient and hundreds of thousands have been exposed to the rains.

Tawila, where most have arrived, is in the throes of a cholera outbreak, as are other parts of Darfur.

The two-year war has left more than half of Sudan's population facing crisis levels of hunger and driven millions from their homes, leaving them especially exposed to the country's damaging annual floods.