Five aid workers killed as convoy carrying food to Darfur families comes under attack

# Five aid workers killed as convoy carrying food to Darfur families comes under attack

*Event date: 2025-06-03*

Five aid workers were killed and several more people injured when a 15-truck humanitarian convoy carrying food into Sudan's Darfur region was attacked near Koma, in an assault that has further endangered efforts to feed civilians cut off by war.

The convoy was trying to reach el-Fasher, one of the last major strongholds of Sudan's military in Darfur, according to the United Nations agencies involved. UNICEF and the World Food Programme said the trucks were carrying much-needed food for families facing starvation. Their joint statement said multiple trucks were burned and critical humanitarian supplies were damaged in the attack.

The agencies said the dead and injured were Sudanese contractors working for WFP and UNICEF. They did not identify who carried out the attack, but they called for an investigation and said the strike violated international humanitarian law. The convoy had travelled more than 1,800 kilometres from Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast before it came under attack.

The assault took place near Koma, a town in North Darfur that is controlled by the Rapid Support Forces, according to the DW report. The UN said it was the first humanitarian convoy bound for el-Fasher to come close to success in more than a year. That detail underlines the scale of the access problem facing aid groups as the siege of the city has tightened and violence has continued across the wider region.

Sudan has been engulfed by war between the Rapid Support Forces and the military-controlled government for two years. The conflict has created what the UN has described as the world's worst humanitarian crisis. DW reported that more than a million people in North Darfur alone are on the brink of starvation, while millions more have been displaced across the country and into neighbouring states.

The latest attack also sharpened the blame game between the warring sides. The RSF said the convoy was hit by a military aircraft in a pre-planned attack. The army-backed government rejected that account and said rebel drones were responsible. Neither claim could be independently verified.

For aid workers, the immediate consequences were visible in the wreckage: burned trucks, injured staff and food that never reached the people for whom it had been packed. In a region where roads are already dangerous and front lines shift quickly, the attack has again shown how little protection humanitarian convoys have in Sudan's war.

The loss matters beyond the convoy itself. Aid groups have warned for months that food deliveries into Darfur are repeatedly delayed or blocked by insecurity, and every failed delivery deepens the risk of famine-like conditions. In this case, the convoy was not carrying military cargo or political supplies, but food intended for civilians.

The investigation called for by UNICEF and WFP will now have to determine not only who fired, but also whether the convoy had any safe route at all. For now, the supplies remain destroyed, the workers are dead, and families in Darfur are again waiting for food that did not arrive.