WAR PUSHES 70% OF SUDANESE INTO POVERTY, UN SAYS. (PHOTO).

 War pushes 70% of Sudanese into poverty, UN says

Around seven in 10 people in Sudan are now living in poverty, UN Development Programme has said, nearly twice as many as before the war between the army and paramilitary forces broke out three years ago.

"Before the war, we were probably looking (at) around 38 percent of people living in poverty, and now we are estimating about 70 percent," said the UN Development Programme's Sudan representative Luca Renda on Tuesday, as the agency released a new report on poverty timed to coincide with the anniversary of the start of the war.

The figures Renda cited were based on a poverty line of about $4 a day, while at least a quarter of the population is believed to be surviving on less than half that, he said, AFP reported.

‘Systematic erosion of a country's future’

Now in its fourth year, the war between Sudan's army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced more than 11 million, and thrust several areas into hunger and famine.

Donors are due to gather in Berlin on Wednesday for an international conference on the conflict, aimed at reviving faltering peace talks and mobilising aid for one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

More than 21 million people in Sudan face acute food insecurity, while two-thirds of the population urgently needs assistance, according to the UN.

Analysts, meanwhile, see little sign of de-escalation, with fighting intensifying in the Kordofan region and Blue Nile state, the UN said.