
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, February 10, 1991                   TAG: 9102100055
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: CAIRO, EGYPT                                LENGTH: Medium

DIPLOMATS SAY THOUSANDS WILL DIE AS SUDAN SHUTS EYES

Tens of thousands of Sudanese will starve this spring, and up to a million more could die unless the government owns up to the famine and allows a relief program to be organized, a Western ambassador says.

As late as Thursday, a minister of the military government spoke of "this alleged famine that ravages 7 million Sudanese people."

The junta leader, Lt. Gen. Omar Hassan el-Bashir, recently told reporters his government refuses to accept relief or assistance "despite the so-called food gap in Sudan. They are seeking to humiliate us and force us to get down on our knees."

One warned Thursday that the disaster, which experts say will bring hunger to a third of the population, could be even worse if rains fail again next summer as they have two summers in a row.

The Western ambassador who agreed to discuss the emergency is among scores of diplomats and relief workers evacuated from Khartoum in mid-January for fear of terror attacks connected with the Persian Gulf War.

He spoke in a telephone interview from his country's capital and refused to be identified further because of the Sudanese government's sensitivity on the question.

Severe malnutrition already is evident in eastern and western Sudan, he and relief workers in Khartoum said in telephone interviews.

In London, a British Cabinet minister lambasted el-Bashir's government for ignoring the famine but said Britain will send 20,000 tons of relief food to the northeast African country anyway.

"The government may not want it, but the people who are starving do," reporters were told by Lynda Chalker, Britain's minister for overseas development.

"The situation in Sudan continues to be immensely depressing," she said. "The Sudanese government is still evading its responsibilities and has not organized the relief operation. But the needs are mounting and the international community must respond."

The relief workers said their operations are almost at a standstill because of the evacuation of agencies' staff and lack of relief supplies.

Another, interviewed in Nairobi, capital of neighboring Kenya, said large numbers of people who left their homes in search of food arrived at Khartoum's outskirts in January. Thirty percent of them "were in a severe state of malnutrition, and a good number showed signs of acute malnutrition."

In Khartoum, Western diplomats and relief officials who seek to discuss the famine are told their help is not needed.

"Whenever we try to talk to anyone in the government, we're told that God and Islamic law will solve any problems," a Western diplomat said by telephone from Khartoum.

In 1988, at least 250,000 Sudanese died in famine.

by CNB