As relief stocks run out, expanding drone warfare, foreign arms supplies and divided diplomacy are worsening one of the world’s largest humanitarian emergencies
By Ramesh Jaura
BERLIN | 12 November 2026 (IDN) – Winter nights in Darfur and northern Sudan can be bitterly cold. Many families displaced by war are nevertheless sleeping beneath plastic sheets, in crowded public buildings or beside damaged houses.
Some have returned to their towns only to find that their homes have been destroyed or looted, water and electricity are unavailable and the nearest clinic is closed.
The UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, and the International Organization for Migration, IOM, warned on 6 November that their stocks of tents, blankets and other essentials were almost exhausted. An estimated 15.4 million people need emergency shelter or basic household items, but available funds allow relief agencies to give priority to only about one in ten.
Even that reduced target has not been met. Only 936,000 people have received assistance.
Mohamed Refaat, head of IOM’s mission in Sudan, said the agency’s warehouses were empty. A convoy of 16 trucks that reached Darfur carried the last of its available stocks.
The shelter shortage is part of an emergency affecting most of the country. About 33.7 million people, roughly two-thirds of Sudan’s population, require humanitarian assistance. The United Nations appealed for $2.9 billion to help 20.4 million people during 2026. By early November, it had received 47 per cent of the requested amount.
The funding gap has forced agencies to narrow programmes that were never designed to cover everybody in need.
Return does not always mean recovery
Around 8.6 million people remain displaced inside Sudan, while more than 4.6 million have crossed its borders. At the same time, more than 5.2 million people have returned to their places of origin.
The number of returnees might suggest that conditions are improving. UN agencies caution, however, that many families are returning to towns without habitable housing, electricity, clean water, healthcare or functioning schools.
Unexploded weapons remain in former battle zones. Employment and local markets have disappeared in many areas. A family can be classified as having returned even when its members are living with relatives or in damaged buildings.
Children account for about half of both the internally displaced and returning populations. Three out of four internally displaced people are women and children.
Some families have gone home because fighting moved elsewhere. Others exhausted their savings or found that neighbouring countries could no longer provide adequate support. Return under such conditions does not necessarily indicate that an area is secure.
Sudan’s internally displaced population has declined from its highest recorded level but rose slightly during the latest reporting month. Further fighting, hunger or service failures could produce another round of displacement.
The effects extend beyond Sudan. IOM says Sudanese have become the largest national group arriving in Europe through the Eastern Mediterranean route. Chad, Egypt, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Libya and the Central African Republic are already hosting large refugee populations from the conflict.
Drones widen the area of conflict
The war began in April 2023 as a struggle for power between the Sudanese Armed Forces, led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces of Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti.
The two commanders had jointly removed Sudan’s civilian-led transitional government in October 2021. Their alliance later broke down over the distribution of power and plans to incorporate the RSF into the regular army.
Fighting that began in Khartoum spread across Sudan. Darfur again became the site of mass atrocities. Kordofan, Blue Nile and the disputed Abyei region have since experienced growing violence.
Armed drones now allow both forces to attack locations far from ground combat. Towns, markets, hospitals, schools, power stations and transport routes have all been hit.
The United Nations says drones caused more than 80 per cent of verified civilian deaths during the first four months of 2026, killing at least 880 people. UN estimates put the toll from drone strikes by both sides at more than 1,000 during the first five months of the year.
A UN fact-finding mission reported that an RSF strike in Kalogi, South Kordofan, killed 114 people, including about 60 children. It said a Sudanese army strike in Ad-Da’ein, East Darfur, killed at least 70 people and destroyed a major hospital.
Responsibility for other attacks remains disputed. Sudan’s government denied that its armed forces carried out the 19 October attack on a market in Abyei. South Sudanese officials had attributed the strike to the Sudanese army, but the United Nations said it was not in a position to determine responsibility.
The RSF has not responded to every allegation concerning attacks in army-held areas. It has said that it does not intentionally target civilians and has accused the Sudanese military of bombing residential districts, markets and hospitals. The Sudanese government, in turn, accuses the RSF of deliberately striking airports, power and water stations, fuel facilities and other civilian infrastructure.
Neither the RSF nor Sudan’s military responded immediately to Reuters requests for comment when the UN fact-finding mission issued its September report on foreign support and drone warfare.
The mutual accusations illustrate a wider problem: attacks are often documented through their consequences, while responsibility remains contested or unclaimed.
Damage beyond the point of impact
During the final week of October, drones reportedly struck power installations every day. Up to 15 power stations were attacked during the month.
Sudan depends on electricity to operate water pumps, treatment facilities, hospitals, vaccine refrigerators and irrigation systems. An attack on a power station can stop dialysis treatment, interrupt water purification, spoil medicines and prevent farmers from irrigating their fields.
Hundreds of aid trucks have been stranded because of fuel shortages. Hospitals have struggled to keep maternity wards and emergency services operating. Damage to electricity and water systems has contributed to cholera outbreaks among communities already weakened by hunger and displacement.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned drone attacks by both parties on 31 October and called for an end to attacks on civilians and critical infrastructure. He urged the two forces to agree on a cessation of hostilities and engage with mediation efforts.
Foreign support sustains both forces
The UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission reported in September that foreign networks were supplying personnel, weapons, training and logistical assistance to the RSF. It also found reasonable grounds to believe that the Sudanese army used foreign-supplied drones in operations that harmed civilians.
The mission said up to 2,000 former Colombian military personnel had worked with RSF units, including some who operated drones, artillery and other advanced weapons. It identified companies, recruiters and transport networks operating across several countries.
The findings indicate that Sudan’s combatants retain access to increasingly advanced weapons even as humanitarian agencies struggle to purchase basic relief supplies.
UN investigators called for responsibility to be examined along the supply chains, including those who order, finance, transport or provide weapons where there is a substantial risk that they will be used in serious violations.
The Security Council’s existing arms embargo remains centred on Darfur. The fact-finding mission has called for it to be extended throughout Sudan, arguing that weapons supplied from abroad are being used against civilians in several regions.
Council members have not agreed on such an extension. Their disagreement reflects wider divisions over how much pressure should be applied to the belligerents and to governments suspected of supporting them.
Hunger deepens as harvests fail
Around 19.5 million people face acute food insecurity. Five million are at emergency levels, while approximately 135,000 face catastrophic conditions. Fourteen areas in North Darfur, South Darfur and South Kordofan could face famine if fighting and restrictions on relief deliveries continue.
Farmers have been driven from their land, markets destroyed and transport routes made unsafe. Seeds, fertiliser and fuel have become more expensive or unavailable.
El Nino has brought severe drought to about half the country. Poor rainfall disrupted planting and reduced prospects for the 2026-27 cereal harvest. In parts of Darfur and Kordofan, food prices have remained high during the period when a new harvest would normally make staples cheaper.
Sorghum prices are nearly three times higher than a year ago, while wheat-flour prices have almost doubled.
Funding shortages have forced the World Food Programme to remove 800,000 people from emergency food assistance through the end of 2026. Many of those who continue to receive assistance are being given rations covering only half their minimum food requirements.
WFP needs $402 million to maintain emergency food and nutrition assistance for four million people between October 2026 and March 2027. It warns that another 1.2 million people could face acute hunger by August 2027 if conditions deteriorate further.
An estimated 825,000 children under five are expected to suffer severe acute malnutrition in 2026, seven per cent more than in 2025 and 25 per cent above the pre-war average.
Malnutrition increases the danger from cholera, measles and other infections. Sudan recorded 264 cholera-related deaths between January and late September, according to the World Health Organization.
WHO has verified 228 attacks on healthcare since the war began, resulting in 2,055 deaths and 817 injuries. Thirty-seven per cent of the country’s health facilities are no longer functioning. WHO had received only 23 per cent of the money requested for its Sudan operation when it issued its October warning.
Schools close as diplomacy stalls
Nearly half of Sudan’s school buildings are no longer functioning, leaving at least eight million children outside school. Some buildings have been damaged or destroyed. Others are sheltering displaced families or stand in areas too dangerous for pupils and teachers.
UNICEF and its partners have reopened schools and established temporary learning spaces in several states. A programme with Save the Children aims to return 328,000 conflict-affected children to education, a small proportion of the national total.
The UN Secretary-General’s personal envoy, Pekka Haavisto, has been seeking an arrangement that would allow pupils throughout Sudan to take a nationally recognised secondary-school examination. He has also pursued prisoner releases and exchanges as confidence-building measures.
These initiatives are proceeding alongside broader negotiations involving the United Nations, African Union, Intergovernmental Authority on Development, League of Arab States, European Union, United States and regional governments.
The Quad and Quintet groups have attempted to coordinate the various initiatives, arrange a humanitarian truce and prepare negotiations on a civilian political transition.
At an October meeting, sponsors of the main initiatives said neither side could achieve a military solution. They called for civilian protection, an end to external military support and a Sudanese-led return to civilian government.
No ceasefire has followed. Governments involved in mediation have differing relationships with the Sudanese army, the RSF and their regional supporters. The result is a diplomatic field with several initiatives but no single process able to secure and enforce an agreement.
The latest UN warning therefore concerns more than an immediate shortage of tents and blankets. It shows how continued warfare, uncertain access and declining financial support are reducing the capacity of aid agencies even where they can reach displaced families.
The return of millions of people to damaged communities could be an early stage of recovery. It could also precede renewed displacement if homes, services and livelihoods are not restored.
Whether the shelter emergency eases will depend on three developments that remain uncertain: replenishment of humanitarian funds, reliable access to affected communities and a reduction in the fighting that continues to create new needs. (IDN-InDepthNews)
Sources: UNHCR and IOM shelter warning, 6 November 2026; IOM displacement and return snapshot; UN statement on escalating drone attacks; UN Fact-Finding Mission on external support networks; WHO food insecurity and malnutrition alert; World Food Programme Sudan emergency; UN diplomatic coordination on Sudan; Reuters on the UN investigation, 3 September 2026.