In the Chadian town of Adre, on the border with Sudan’s Darfur region, one of the gravest humanitarian catastrophes in the contemporary world is unfolding, according to the British newspaper Sunday Times.
The paper’s chief foreign affairs correspondent, Christina Lamb, documented what she witnessed firsthand in the town, where a vast informal camp stretches across sandy dunes, sheltering more than 160,000 Sudanese refugees. Most are women and children who fled a brutal war now in its fourth year, escaping killing, rape, hunger and the collapse of all basic foundations of life.
According to the newspaper, the United Nations estimates that more than one million Sudanese have crossed into Chad since the outbreak of the war in April 2023, after cities and towns across Darfur were transformed into scenes of mass killing.
Testimonies of the Victims
Residents of the Adre camp live in makeshift shelters built from sticks, grass and plastic, offering no protection from scorching heat or seasonal rains. There are no schools or basic facilities, and families survive on meagre aid that falls short of sustaining life.
Lamb met several women in the temporary camp who recounted the horrors they endured, both during the war in Sudan and through the harsh reality of displacement.
Among them is Suad, now 13 years old. She was just 12 when she was raped by a fighter from the Rapid Support Forces in a market in El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur state in western Sudan.
Suad saw the bodies of her relatives and members of her Masalit community piling up in the streets. The deeper trauma awaited her in the corner of an abandoned shop, where she was raped at gunpoint by an RSF gunman.
According to the correspondent, Suad’s ordeal began when the Rapid Support Forces and allied Arab militias stormed the city in April 2023.
Suad says the fighter dragged her into the deserted shop and threatened to kill her if she spoke. After reaching Chad, her family discovered she was pregnant. She refused an abortion for religious reasons and gave birth to a baby girl, while she herself is still a child.
Today, Suad sits in the Adre camp, gently rocking her infant daughter, Souma, recalling how “his face, his weapon and his knife chase me in my nightmares every night”.
Her story represents only the tip of the iceberg, according to Zahra Khamis, a Sudanese psychologist who founded the Al Zahra Centre for survivors of sexual violence after losing her own son during the escape.
Failure of the International Community
Khamis says the centre supports around 350 survivors, while the United Nations estimates that more than half of the women and girls fleeing Sudan have suffered some form of sexual violence. Many, she notes, do not dare to speak.
The newspaper reports that British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper, who visited the Adre camp alongside actress Carey Mulligan, appeared shocked by the scale of the atrocities. She openly accused the international community of failing to protect Sudanese women, saying the world is abandoning victims living in a city built on sand for the displaced and forgotten.
She described what is happening as widespread sexual violence and said the international community has failed Sudan, particularly its women. She added that civilians are paying the price for the conflict between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces, a war that has killed and displaced millions.
Women and children make up about 85 percent of Adre’s population. They live in huts of straw and branches that offer no protection from heat or rain. Women work in brick kilns or queue for hours carrying water, while barefoot children line up for scraps of food.
As families struggle to survive, international aid is shrinking at an alarming rate. The World Food Programme has been forced to cut food rations to less than half of the minimum required, providing just 840 calories per person per day due to severe funding cuts, the newspaper reports.
Patrice Ahouansou, the UN refugee agency’s representative in Chad, says his organisation has received only 20 percent of the funding it needs, warning of an unavoidable catastrophe as refugees continue to arrive daily.
Complicity
Anger permeates the camp, not only because of hunger but because of a sense of international betrayal, according to Lamb.
Fouda, a 20 year old secondary school student who survived gang rape by RSF fighters and now lives with lasting physical and psychological scars, asks bitterly where the weapons destroying her people come from.
She recounts how a vehicle carrying RSF fighters intercepted her as she tried to flee. “They beat me, then raped me one after another,” she says quietly. She was left with a broken shoulder and bleeding that lasted weeks. Later, she discovered she was pregnant and gave birth to a child. “The Rapid Support Forces stole my dignity, and they must be held accountable,” she says.
Many refugees blame the international community for the continuation of the tragedy, not only for failing to stop the war but also for the flow of weapons.
Refugees accuse regional states of supplying arms to the Rapid Support Forces, accusations those states deny. Human rights organisations point to documented serial numbers, satellite imagery and flight paths.
International reports and investigations indicate ongoing flows of weapons and drones across borders, as regional and global powers trade accusations.
Hunger and Violence
Inside Sudan itself, conditions appear even bleaker. Jan Egeland says after a field visit that during his career he has never seen a wider gap between needs and what is actually delivered.
He says civilians are trapped by hunger and violence in areas unreachable by aid, warning that what is happening in Darfur now is a horrific repetition of ethnic cleansing crimes committed two decades ago, this time met with near total silence.
According to the Sunday Times, new refugees arrive in Adre every day from cities such as El Fasher and Nyala. Mahmoud Youssef Ahmed, 58, says he saw bodies in the streets and that RSF fighters were killing men and raping women.
He spent five months imprisoned in a shipping container with dozens of other men before being released for ransom, then fled with his family to Chad.
Even inside the camp, safety is not guaranteed. Dar Al Salam, a community leader, says violence persists, including rape and constant fear after nightfall.
In one incident, an older sister returned to find a 17 year old refugee raping her younger sister. He was imprisoned for just two months and then released.
She adds that the absence of schools and deep poverty drive some boys towards violence, while some women are forced into sex in exchange for food to survive.
Among the many harrowing stories is that of five year old Makary. Her mother, Tayba, 28, left her daughters to work. One day, the older girl returned to find a 17 year old refugee raping her younger sister. He served two months in prison and was released.
Tayba says, “Sometimes my youngest wakes at night crying and says the boy came to her. I cannot leave her to work, but food rations are no longer enough after being cut in half.”
During her visit, the British foreign secretary pledged to push for a humanitarian ceasefire and announced additional funding to support survivors of sexual violence, as well as sanctions against military leaders. Refugees and aid workers say these steps fall far short of the scale of the catastrophe.
The newspaper captured the cruelty of the scene through words spoken by Dar Al Salam as she shook her head. “Sometimes we feel as if humanity itself has died here in Sudan.”
