The nations bordering Sudan include South Sudan, the Central African Republic, Ethiopia, and Libya, all affected by their own recent conflicts.
The collapse of law and order in Sudan and “a lot of people desperate to move on” would provide fertile ground for human trafficking, while arms circulating across borders could engender more violence, said Grandi.
“We’ve seen it in Libya with the Sahel. We don’t want a repeat of that because that will be a multiplier of crisis and of humanitarian problems,” he said.
The United Nations has appealed for US$470 million for its refugee response to the Sudan crisis over six months, an amount that Grandi said was just 1 per cent funded, adding that a donor-pledging conference was “very much needed” and that an international community preoccupied with Ukraine was not paying enough attention.
“You can clearly sense a disparity which is very dangerous. This crisis has the potential to destabilise an entire region and beyond as much as Ukraine does in Europe,” he said.
Grandi said UNHCR was trying to establish a presence in the northern Sudanese town of Wadi Halfa, where many Sudanese men aged 16 to 50 have become stuck applying for visas to enter Egypt, but that he was not sure when this would be possible. Women, children and the elderly do not need visas.
He also said aid needed to be delivered into a buffer zone between the Egyptian and Sudanese border posts where those fleeing have also faced long waits.
Since the conflict began, nearly 160,000 people have crossed from Sudan into Egypt, which was already home to a large Sudanese community.
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