Khartoum.- The Governor of the Sudanese region of Darfur, Minni Arko Minawi, requested this Tuesday "urgent international aid" after the death of around a thousand people in a landslide that buried a village in that
region of the west of the African country.
"I urge international humanitarian organizations to intervene urgently and provide support and assistance at this critical moment," Minawi said in a message on his social media account.
He emphasized that "the tragedy is greater than what our people can bear alone", lamenting that "we have lost a large number of people in a devastating natural disaster and offer our condolences to the victims and their families".
The landslide occurred last Sunday in the village of Tasrin, in the Jebel (mount) Marra region of Central Darfur state, and was caused by the heavy rains that lashed the area in recent days, according to a statement issued in the last few hours by an armed movement that controls the area.
The note from the so-called Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLM/A, according to its English acronym) stated that "preliminary information indicates that all the inhabitants of the village (Tasrin), estimated at more than a thousand people, lost their lives, with the exception of a single survivor".
He underlined that the area where the tragedy occurred "was completely devastated", and urged "the United Nations, regional and international organizations, and the living human conscience to help us recover from the rubble the bodies of the dead, whose number is estimated at more than a thousand men, women and children".
Yebel Marra, where the village of Tasrin is located, is a volcanic mountain range, with the highest peaks in Sudan, and its area encompasses the states of North, Central and South Darfur.
That active conflict zone is known to be the main stronghold of the SLM/A, led by Abdelwahid Nour.
For its part, the Supreme Council, controlled by the Sudanese Army, which governs in Khartoum, "deeply regretted" this Tuesday in a statement "the loss of the victims of the landslide in Jebel Marra, which claimed the lives of hundreds of innocent civilians as a result of the heavy rains in the region".
He also offered to "allocate all possible resources to provide support and relief to those affected by this painful disaster."
The Darfur region is composed of five states, all controlled by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which have been at war with the regular army in a devastating war since April 2023.
In that immense western region, the Sudanese Army only controls the city of Al Fasher, capital of North Darfur and target of almost daily attacks by the RSF, while the SLM/A, of Abdelwahid Nour, governs some areas in the states of Central and North Darfur, and has declared itself neutral, so it does not participate in the war.
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