Over 55,000 Sudanese Refugees Have Fled to Chad This Year, UN Says

More than 55,000 Sudanese refugees have fled into neighboring Chad so far this year, the UN refugee agency UNHCR has said, according to Anadolu Agency. Daily arrivals have surged to more than 400 over the past week, the agency reported, as fighting and insecurity worsen in Sudan.

The report did not specify the precise regions of Sudan from which the refugees are fleeing or the specific areas of Chad receiving the new arrivals, though Chad has for years hosted large numbers of Sudanese refugees along their shared border, particularly from Sudan's Darfur region.

Sudan has been engulfed in a civil war since April 2023, when fighting broke out between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The conflict has triggered what the United Nations and other humanitarian organizations have repeatedly described as one of the world's largest displacement and humanitarian crises, with millions of people forced from their homes both within Sudan and across its borders into countries including Chad, Egypt, South Sudan and Libya.

Chad, one of the world's poorest countries, has faced significant strain on its resources and humanitarian infrastructure in absorbing successive waves of Sudanese refugees since the war began, prompting repeated appeals from aid organizations for greater international funding and support.

UNHCR has periodically updated its figures on Sudanese displacement as the conflict continues, though the report did not indicate whether the pace of arrivals reflected a specific escalation in fighting in a particular part of Sudan in the preceding week.

Further comment from Chadian authorities or additional details on the humanitarian response to the new arrivals were not included in the available reporting.