Darfur Children ‘On Brink Of Starvation’

03/04/10 | Sky News

Darfur is on the brink of a new human catastrophe, with children increasingly at risk of starvation because of drought and neglect, says a children's charity.

The children, many of whom have known nothing but war, are uncared for and the situation is getting worse, Kids For Kidscharity founder Patricia Parker said.

"I am struggling to come to terms with what I saw in the hospital in El Fasher, the regional capital of North Darfur," she told Sky News Online.

"Small babies, their sunken eyes too big for their little faces, legs and arms stick thin, gazed solemnly at me, too weak to cry.

"They come from the villages and no one seems to want to know about them. The world is weary of Darfur."

Mrs Parker founded the charity after a visit to the western region of Sudan in 2001, where her son was based.

"I saw a nine-year-old boy staggering under the weight of a gerry can filled with water. I went back with him to his home wondering what sort of mother would allow her child to do such heavy work.

"When I got there, I found her looking after her other children and the family's goats.

"With water, the boy not only nourished the family but also the goats - who kept the children alive. That's where I got the name of the charity from - a kid looking after the kids."

Mrs Parker says aid agencies should have a bigger presence in the region - there was a major withdrawal at the height of the violence because of safety fears.

However, she says having been there only last week, the region showed far fewer signs of violence than in the past.

"The international community knows exactly what the situation is but it's just not doing anything about it. Why not? Why does no one care?"

Despite its frustration at the apparent desertion of the children of Darfur, the charity has brought some sense of hope, building a midwives' training school in El Fasher last year and seeing it produce 40 new graduates.

The midwives are key because many mothers do not know how to look after their children, often giving them starch to eat when they are too young and then seeing them subsequently fall ill with diarrhoea and vomiting.

The lucky graduates are now travelling back to their villages with a new donkey, leather sandals, a medical kit and, for the first time, a mobile phone and phone card so the donkey ambulance can be summoned in an emergency.

"These may appear small things," Mrs Parker says, "But, in Darfur villages, they are the difference between life and death."