60 children trapped in Sudan fighting die in Khartoum orphanage

Most of the 60 children perished over the past six weeks in an orphanage in Sudan's capital Khartoum due to inadequate access to food and fever. Over the last weekend, 26 of them died in a span of two days.

A truck delivering items of food, medicine and baby formula at an orphanage in Khartoum, Sudan.

As fighting between Sudan's army and paramilitary forces continues for nearly two months, at least 60 infants, toddlers and older children have died over the past six weeks while trapped in deplorable conditions in an orphanage in Khartoum.

Most of the children perished due to inadequate access to food and fever. Over the last weekend, 26 of them died in a span of two days, Associated Press (AP) reported. Those who died included infants as young as three months, according to the death certificates and four orphanage officials and charity workers working at the facility.

Heartbreaking videos shot by orphanage workers at the Al-Mayqoma orphanage showed bodies of children wrapped in white sheets awaiting burial. In another video, two dozen toddlers wearing diapers, many of them crying, sat on the floor of a room, while a woman is carrying two metal jugs of water.

A woman, in another video, was seen sitting on the floor with her back facing the camera and rocking back and forth, apparently cradling a child.

Describing the situation as "catastrophic", an orphanage worker said the children were shifted to a large room following last week's heavy shelling nearby that blanketed the facility with dust.

“It is a catastrophic situation,” Afkar Omar Moustafa, a volunteer at the orphanage, said in a phone interview. “This was something we expected from day one (of the fighting).”