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Transcript/Script((PLAYBOOK SLUG: CHAD DARFUR FAMINE
HEADLINE: Man recalls burying infants who starved at Darfur camp
TEASER: Starvation is claiming lives in Darfur’s besieged Zamzam camp, trapped by conflict and cut off from aid
PUBLISHED: 02/11/2025 Tuesday at 7:09 am
BYLINE: Henry Wilkins
DATELINE: Adre, Chad
VIDEOGRAPHER: Henry Wilkins
VIDEO EDITOR: Henry Wilkins
PRODUCER: Jonathan Spier
SCRIPT EDITORS: MAS, Page
VIDEO SOURCE (S): VOA, REUTERS
PLATFORMS (mark with X): WEB __ TV _X_ RADIO_X_
TRT: 2:31
VID APPROVED BY: Decherd
EDITOR NOTES:)) There is a radio piece to accompany this.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/02/10/sudan-military-rsf-war-darfur/c27f8bf8-e7ab-11ef-969b-cfbefacb1eb3_story.html
https://www.wfp.org/emergencies/sudan-emergency#:~:text=A%20total%20of%2024.6%20million,threshold%20for%20a%20famine%20confirmation.
((INTRO))
[[The U.N. has declared a famine in at least five areas of Sudan where it says people are dying daily from starvation and related illnesses. One of those areas includes the besieged Zamzam displacement camp in North Darfur. Reporter Henry Wilkins spoke to refugees who fled the camp.]]
((VIDEO-VOA: REFUGEE WALKING THROUGH ADRE - various))
((NARRATOR))
This man arrived at a refugee site at Chad’s border with Sudan two days earlier, after making a perilous 340-kilometer journey on foot from the Zamzam displacement camp in North Darfur.
The camp is gripped by famine and besieged by the hostile Rapid Support Forces, or RSF.
The man asked to remain anonymous for security reasons.
((Darfuri Refugee (in Arabic, 13 seconds)))
“I swear, what is happening in Zamzam is devastating. Explosions have turned citizens into corpses. No money and no food. Sometimes, you go the whole day eating only one meal.”
((Henry Wilkins, VOA News ((in English)))
“He recounted how he and other members of the community in Zamzam had to bury 25 infants who had died of starvation. According to the U.N., parts of Darfur are in a state of famine. The world's first in seven years.”
((VIDEO-REUTERS: ZAMZAM CAMP - various, VIDEO-X: RSF - various, ZAMZAM RESIDENT - various))
((NARRATOR))
https://www.msf.org/food-must-be-delivered-people-starved-blockade-zamzam-camp
Aid groups and residents say the camp of 300,000 inhabitants is also being regularly shelled by the RSF, one of the warring parties in Sudan’s civil war that evolved from the Janjaweed militia.
https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/12/1157726
Another Zamzam resident who fled to Chad, also asked to remain anonymous, for fear of reprisals.
https://www.un.org/africarenewal/news/guterres-calls-%E2%80%98immediate%E2%80%99-ceasefire-sudan-death-toll-mounts
((Darfuri Refugee (in Arabic, 12 seconds)))
“When we first arrived, we thought it would be safe because humanitarian organizations were based there. We assumed the Janjaweed wouldn’t attack them — but they did…’’
((VIDEO-REUTERS: ZAMZAM CAMP - various, VIDEO-X: RSF - various, ZAMZAM RESIDENT - various))
((NARRATOR))
He said the young and the elderly were the first to perish.
((Darfuri Refugee (in Arabic, 10 seconds)))
“The elderly and children were the most vulnerable. Many families lost their young ones due to malnutrition and lack of medical care.”
((VIDEO-REUTERS: PEANUT OIL PRODUCTION - various, WFP VEHICLES IN CHAD - various))
((NARRATOR))
The U.N.’s World Food Program says the famine stems from conflict.
https://x.com/i/flow/login?redirect_after_login=%2Flkinzli
((For radio: Leni Kinzli is head of communications for the World Food Program in Sudan))
((Leni Kinzli, World Food Program (in English, 22 secs)))
‘’I think the main point, you know, is this is a man-made conflict and the famine, as a result, is also man-made. And the solution can only be man-made. A humanitarian pause would be required to ramp up, to the scale that’s needed to prevent this from really becoming one of the world’s worst hunger or famine situations in decades."
((VIDEO-REUTERS: WFP FOOD DISTRIBTUION in CHAD - various))
((NARRATOR))
As the UN continues to distribute food for the refugees here in Chad, it says the famine in Darfur is expected to spread to five more regions of Sudan by mid-2025.
https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/12/1158511#:~:text=Sudan%20is%20confronting%20a%20widening,released%20on%20Tuesday%20has%20found.
((Henry Wilkins, VOA News, Adre, Chad.))
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