I was the first charity director to reach Khartoum – the devastation in Sudan shocked even me

I was the first UK charity director to visit Khartoum since the Sudan crisis began. Access to the capital is highly restricted, however, as soon as we secured approval, I knew I had to visit to witness firsthand the epicentre of the Sudanese people’s latest struggle, so we set out on the 14-and-a-half-hour car journey to Khartoum. The destruction of the city is evidence itself that the international community has failed the Sudanese people.

When I arrived in Khartoum, a city with a population of 6.8 million people, I was stunned by how eerily quiet the streets were. No matter which area of the city we drove through, people were a rare sight, the deserted streets a stark reminder that we walked in the aftermath of a battleground. Every building bore the scars of the conflict, the ones that weren’t totally destroyed or burnt to the ground were either bombed out or riddled with bullet holes.

Women and children, like in many conflicts, have borne the brunt of the atrocities committed against civilians during this war, and Khartoum was no exception. I met a government minister in the city who told me that when the militias were closing in on the city, many women and girls who were trapped in their buildings and unable to escape chose to kill themselves rather than face the brutal horrors they knew were coming.

During the conflict in Khartoum, hundreds of women were held hostage by militia groups, unable to leave the buildings they were trapped in for two years. The harrowing abuses, including sexual violence, are unimaginable. Tragically, this drove some women to suicide unable to cope with the trauma in the aftermath. Their bodies were later discovered only once the militias were driven out.

The sheer scale of the human impact of this conflict is devastating. The psychological trauma that has scarred so many Sudanese people will need significant rehabilitation, but a lack of international funding means the possibility of this is far off for so many.

The city’s vital infrastructure has been completely battered. Over 200 schools have been destroyed by the violence. 17 million Sudanese children have been out of education during this war. Sudan’s future is in the hands of these children, and though many children have fled to so-called safe areas they are still a long way from returning to formal education. Some people managed to escape the capital before they were caught up in the fighting. My Islamic Relief colleagues were also forced to flee, being displaced to Port Sudan, a 14.5-hour road trip away from their homes and their office.

During the exodus from Khartoum, one of our drivers heroically tried to evacuate a colleague who was trapped in an area of intense fighting. They were stopped by a militia group, and a gun was pointed at his head. He told me he believed his time was up. By some miracle, one of the armed men saw the Islamic Relief logo on the car and remembered how Islamic Relief Sudan had created a life-changing water project in his home village in Darfur and told his comrades to leave them and let the car pass.

During the conflict in the city, there was mass looting (our own offices were looted), including cars and vehicles, so some of those who fled had to do so on foot. I spoke to one woman, a grandmother, whose four sons had been killed by militias. She picked up her grandchildren and walked, the only means left of getting out. They walked for five days in dangerous territory until they reached the state of Gedaref, the closest ‘safe’ zone to Khartoum. There, a local village took her and her grandchildren in, the villagers sharing what little food they had, despite the hardships they were facing themselves.

I’d read the headlines and heard the reports from colleagues, but none of these has done justice to the sheer scale of the horrors the Sudanese people have been forced to endure. And yet, despite the physical destruction, the Sudanese colleagues and families I spent time with still remain hopeful.

It’s this hope that drives ordinary Sudanese people to care for their displaced compatriots arriving in their homes and villages. This hope is marred, though, by the fear that the worst is not yet over. The international community owes it to the people of Sudan to deliver real support in their darkest hour. It has a moral responsibility to alleviate the suffering of the Sudanese people by using all available tools to stop the conflict and restore essential infrastructure and services that Sudan’s people vitally need. Until then, this conflict will remain the world's collective failure.

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Zia Salik is the interim director of Islamic Relief UK.

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