Thousands of people have fled fierce street battles in central Khartoum for Sudan's borders, waiting for days to enter Egypt or walking hundreds of kilometres to cross into South Sudan.
Rana Ameen, a 23-year-old engineering student, said she and five family members had paid the equivalent of $600 each to travel to the border crossing with Egypt, almost 1,000km away.
To reach the bus station on the outskirts of Omdurman, Khartoum's twin city on the other bank of the Nile, the family were forced to make their way through the centre of the capital, where bitter fighting between two armed generals has caused thousands of people to flee the airstrikes and artillery fire. Once they reached the border, the situation worsened, as they waited to cross for three days in the desert.
"It was a deadly trip," she said. "At the border crossing, there was barely food, water and no bathrooms. Babies were crying as they lay on the ground."
Others reported that Egyptian security officials held up young men, separating them from loved ones, citing a need for extra security checks.
From time to time, a truck would bring water to the people at the border crossing, but before it could even reach a small supermarket nearby, the water would run out. Food prices at the border were three times their usual prices.
Esta historia es de la edición May 05, 2023 de The Guardian Weekly.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición May 05, 2023 de The Guardian Weekly.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
Finn family murals
The optimism that runs through Finnish artist Tove Jansson's Moomin stories also appears in her public works, now on show in a Helsinki exhibition
I hoped Finland would be a progressive dream.I've had to think again Mike Watson
Oulu is five hours north from Helsinki by train and a good deal colder and darker each winter than the Finnish capital. From November to March its 220,000 residents are lucky to see daylight for a couple of hours a day and temperatures can reach the minus 30s. However, this is not the reason I sense a darkening of the Finnish dream that brought me here six years ago.
A surplus of billionaires is destabilising our democracies Zoe Williams
The concept of \"elite overproduction\" was developed by social scientist Peter Turchin around the turn of this century to describe something specific: too many rich people for not enough rich-person jobs.
'What will people think? I don't care any more'
At 90, Alan Bennett has written a sex-fuelled novella set in a home for the elderly. He talks about mourning Maggie Smith, turning down a knighthood and what he makes of the new UK prime minister
I see you
What happens when people with acute psychosis meet the voices in their heads? A new clinical trial reveals some surprising results
Rumbled How Ali ran rings around apartheid, 50 years ago
Fifty years ago, in a corner of white South Africa, Muhammad Ali already seemed a miracle-maker.
Trudeau faces 'iceberg revolt'as calls grow for PM to quit
Justin Trudeau, who promised “sunny ways” as he won an election on a wave of public fatigue with an incumbent Conservative government, is now facing his darkest and most uncertain political moment as he attempts to defy the odds to win a rare fourth term.
Lost Maya city revealed through laser mapping
After swapping machetes and binoculars for computer screens and laser mapping, a team of researchers have discovered a lost Maya city containing temple pyramids, enclosed plazas and a reservoir which had been hidden for centuries by the Mexican jungle.
'A civil war' Gangs step up assault on capital
Armed fighters advance into neighbourhoods at the heart of Port-au-Prince as authorities try to restore order
Reality bites in the Himalayan 'kingdom of happiness'
High emigration and youth unemployment levels belie the mountain nation's global reputation for cheeriness