With hostilities still ongoing in Sudan, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has been forced to suspend support services at the Turkish Hospital in Khartoum and evacuate its staff, highlighting the need for a ceasefire to allow citizens get medical assistance.
Development Diaries reports that despite MSF providing continuous, hands-on, life-saving treatment in the facility for almost 14 months, recent events have made it impossible for the support to continue.
We understand that MSF staff working at the Turkish hospital have been frequently harassed both inside the facility and on the street going to and from work over the past year.
Many have been threatened with arrest. At the start of June, one MSF employee was arrested inside the hospital by two armed men, taken to an unknown location, and severely beaten.
This grossly violates the tenets of International Humanitarian Law which seeks to protect those who are not, or are no longer, taking part in the fighting, and sets limits on the means and methods of warfare.
‘The situation in the Turkish hospital, located in a Rapid Support Forces-controlled area, has become untenable’ says MSF’s head of emergency response in Sudan, Claire Nicolet.
‘Multiple violent incidents have taken place inside and outside the premises over the past 12 months, and the lives of our staff have been repeatedly threatened’.
‘Most recently, on the nights of 17 and 18 June, dozens of wounded combatants were brought to the Turkish hospital, and our team was aggressively woken up as Kalashnikovs were fired into their bedrooms. This type of violence against our staff is unacceptable’.
Since the start of the war, the Turkish hospital has been a crucial part of the health system, serving patients not only from Khartoum, but also from as far away as Wad Madani in Al-Jazirah state.
Development Diaries calls on all parties to the conflict, the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces, to stop the continuous attack on health facilities and care workers as enshrined in the international humanitarian law.
Source: MSF
Photo source: MSF