Famine in Sudan

This report charges that the Sudanese government's abusive tactics, and the predatory practices of rebel forces and government-sponsored tribal militia, have turned this famine into a disaster requiring the largest emergency relief operation in the world in 1998,and the largest airlift operation since the Berlin airlift. The government spends about one million dollars a day on the war, roughly the same amount the international community spent on relief at the height of the famine. It also urges the warring parties to end looting and attacks on civilians, as well as the diversion of civilian relief aid. It calls on the Sudan government and rebel authorities to punish those guilty of such abuses. And it asks that the international community actively support U.N.human rights monitors for Sudan, either inside the country or on its borders, who would be tasked to promptly inform the world of human rights abuses, especially those that might lead to another famine. Finally, the report calls on the government of Sudan to honor the promise it made to the U.N. Secretary-General in 1998, to provide humanitarian access to rebel areas of the Nuba Mountains which have been besieged for ten years by the government.