– British foreign secretary laments lack of global attention to crises in Africa compared with conflicts in other regions

LONDON – The UK strongly condemned ongoing violence in Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo on Tuesday, describing the crises as “one of the biggest humanitarian catastrophes of our lifetimes.”

In a statement to Parliament, Foreign Secretary David Lammy highlighted the dire conditions in Sudan, where a conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has now lasted 21 months.

The most recent escalation saw RSF forces attack the last functional hospital in El-Fasher, Darfur, killing at least 70 patients and their companions, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Lammy also decried the RSF’s recent shelling of the Zamzam camp for internally displaced people in western Sudan as well as reports of extrajudicial killings by militias aligned with the SAF in Wad Madani.

“These attacks show a callous disregard for international humanitarian law and innocent Sudanese civilians,” the statement said.

Having recently visited Adré on the Chad-Sudan border, Lammy recounted firsthand accounts of suffering from refugees, 88% of whom are women and children.

“I met a woman who showed me her scars. She had been burned. She had been beaten. She had been raped,” he said.

Turning to the Democratic Republic of Congo, he described the worsening conflict in the east, where M23 rebels have pushed into the region’s major city, Goma, for the first time since 2012.

The offensive has already claimed the lives of UN peacekeepers from South Africa, Malawi and Uruguay, while hundreds of thousands of people have been forced to flee.

The crisis has made the region one of the most dangerous places in the world for women and girls, with children as young as nine reportedly mutilated by machete-wielding militias.

Lammy lamented the lack of global attention to the crises in Africa, contrasting it with conflicts in other regions.

“There should be no hierarchy of conflicts,” he said, calling for greater international engagement.

He emphasized the need for immediate action, calling for a permanent ceasefire between Sudan’s warring factions, unrestricted humanitarian access and a permanent UN presence.

The UK has also updated its travel guidance, advising British nationals to avoid Rubavu district in western Rwanda near the conflict-ridden border with Goma.

Despite acknowledging the complexities of the conflicts, Lammy insisted that inaction was not an option.

“Civilians in Sudan and eastern DRC must feel so powerless. Power seems gripped by those waging war around them,” he said, adding the UK would “keep doing all in our power to get the world focused on these conflicts — and, somehow, to bring them to an end.”