Sudan Crisis: People looking to flee Sudan and enter neighbouring Egypt are facing exorbitant costs as only people travelling on buses with special permits can cross the border.
A family from Sudan said that they are among thousands stuck at the country’s border with Egypt trying to flee amid the conflict. Their woes are further increased by drivers who are demanding $40,000 to hire a bus to cross the border. The conflict between the Sudanese Army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has led to hundreds dying while tens of thousands of people fled for their lives in two weeks of conflict. Together, the factions toppled a civilian government in an October 2021 coup and are now locked in a power struggle that derailed an internationally backed transition to democracy. The conflict threatens to destabilise the fragile region.
According to a report by the BBC, people looking to flee Sudan and enter neighbouring Egypt are facing exorbitant costs as only people travelling on buses with special permits can cross the border while crossing on foot is prohibited.
A seven-member family, including three children under 10, escaped the fighting in the capital city Khartoum two days ago. Fadi Atabani said that his family, including an 88-year-old woman, were trapped, the report mentioned.
“There are thousands of people here. There is no accommodation. People are sleeping in schools or [on] mattresses,” he told the BBC from the border town of Wadi Halfa.
Most members of the family have British nationality and Atabani is urging the UK authorities for help.
“I cannot guarantee my children’s medical health here we are in the middle of the desert. I want the British government to assist me in evacuating or a bus which can get us across the border,” he said, as quoted by the report.
He accused local bus drivers of taking advantage of the desperate situation amid the Sudan crisis.
“On a normal day the cost of hiring a bus is $3,000. As of today people are paying $40,000 to charter a bus to the border – only 30km,” the 53-year-old claimed, as per the BBC.
“Who has that sort of money? The banks were closed, ATM machines are not working,” he said.
The report mentioned a Khartoum resident named Hosna as saying that she had two daughters trapped in the Sudanese capital. She informed that they faced fares of over $400 each to travel to the border while earlier, the journey cost around $25.
She had arrived in the Egyptian city of Aswan before the violence began to try and make money for which she took a job serving in a tea shop at the bus station that has now become a hub for refugees near Aswan. “My daughters saw an artillery shell fall in our neighbourhood. I could not bring them here. I don’t have a husband or a son to help them. I work day in day out to save money,” she told the BBC.