'I will never return' Fear and hunger hasten exodus from besieged city

Aisha had wanted to stay with her husband when the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) laid siege to the Sudanese city of El Fasher this year. But as the shelling and bombing escalated, and supplies of essentials ran low, she was left with no choice.

- Zeinab Mohammed Salih

"There's nothing there, no water to drink or food to eat," said Aisha, 31, who is married to a soldier in the regular army, the Sudanese armed forces (SAF), and did not want to give her last name. "I will never return."

Her escape through the city's western gate - the only one not controlled by the RSF - was fraught with risk. "Several times when I tried to board a lorry a shell landed nearby, and I ran away," said Aisha, from the relative safety of a road heading west to Tawila, a town controlled by a rebel group that has for now stayed neutral in Sudan's civil war. "I came back week after week to try again."

Aid workers estimate that hundreds of thousands of people have followed the same route in recent months, taking a road that follows a V-shape around the Zamzam refugee camp and then runs west to Tawila and beyond.

The road is dotted with checkpoints consisting of pieces of wood placed on car tyres and manned by men carrying AK-47s, who demand money to let vehicles pass. Ahmed Konchi, who makes a living as a lorry driver ferrying people out of El Fasher, said the demands had risen in recent weeks. "I have to pay at least 5,000 Sudanese pounds (£6) at every checkpoint, and there are more than 15 now," he said. "This increases the cost of a place on the lorry, and many families cannot afford it."