Aid agencies fearing an upsurge of fighting in Sudan's troubled Darfur region have suspended operations and evacuated staff from the volatile Jebel Marra area in West Darfur state, UN officials said on Friday.
Tensions have steadily escalated in the arid west of Africa's largest country since African rebels took 18 Arab civilians hostage from a bus and ambushed a convoy transporting senior government officials through the region last month.
There were unconfirmed reports that the hostages may have been released on Friday after several thousand Arab militiamen, known as Janjaweed, threatened an offensive against the rebels, the United Nations said.
Lawlessness and insecurity have now forced aid groups working in the mountainous Jebel Marra region to evacuate staff from an area where 160,000 refugees rely on food handouts.
"We have pulled out all our staff from Jebel Marra and airlifted out another 88 NGO (non-governmental organisation) staff," said Barry Came, the spokesman for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) in Sudan.
"Any NGOs still there only have a skeleton staff or are flying in each morning and leaving again at night," he told Reuters by phone from Khartoum, adding that the situation for the homeless would be grave without food distribution.
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