“It is unconscionable that in Gaza and Sudan, more than a million people are facing famine, with hundreds dying every day, because starvation is being used as a weapon of war.”
By Apsana Begum MP
According to the World Food Programme, as many as hundreds of millions of people are facing chronic food shortages.
When it comes to conflicts and war, we know that it is common for civilians to suffer from starvation and conflict-induced hunger. While starvation may occur as an unintended consequence of military activities, it is also sometimes intentionally used by conflicting parties as a method of warfare.
Of course, the employment of starvation tactics during armed conflict is morally repugnant.
This condemnation is reflected in many instruments of international law, which prohibit the use of starvation as a method of warfare in all armed conflicts.
It is therefore unconscionable that in Gaza and Sudan, more than a million people are facing famine, with hundreds dying every day, because starvation is being used as a weapon of war. The level of suffering is unbearable, and all the more so because it is so preventable.
In Sudan, millions of people are facing acute hunger due to the war Civilians, caught in the middle of the warring militias, are starving. Aid organisations have said that a quarter of the children in central Darfur state are so malnourished that they could soon die.
There are multiple reports of the looting of crops and aid hubs, and in Darfur, hundreds and thousands are already on the brink of famine, the Sudanese army is refusing to let UN aid trucks through the border to reach the population.
In Gaza, according to humanitarian organisations on the ground, 96% of the population is facing acute food insecurity.
Israel’s denial of humanitarian aid into Gaza, closure of the Rafah crossing, and targeting of humanitarian aid workers has been utterly shocking.
The UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food has accused Israel of an “intentional and targeted starvation campaign against the Palestinian people”.
We must continue to call for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire across all of Gaza, to allow the people of Gaza to rebuild their homes and their lives.
It is welcomed though that the Government have announced that they would resume funding to UNWRA, who are the largest provider of humanitarian aid in Gaza.
So international cooperation, solidarity and internationalism have never been more crucial.
We all have a duty to stand up against human rights abuses such as using starvation as a weapon of war.
We need to be calling on our government to play its role in alleviating food poverty worldwide through aid.
We also need an honest assessment of the impact of wealthy interests – including loans, privatisation, and financialisation – on standards of living, inequality, service provision and climate change.
This is especially significant for the Global South who continue to suffer the legacies of colonialism and the ongoing reality of imperialism.
We also need to recognise that the impact of these legacies is also felt acutely at home in the UK, where the prevalence of foodbanks and foodbank usage has increased in recent years.
At an event in July organised by the Right to Food London campaign, my colleague Ian Byrne MP (Founder of Fans Supporting Foodbanks) and Sarah Woolley, Secretary of the Bakers Food and Allied Workers Union (BFAWU), reiterated calls for the right to food to be enshrined into law.
In the UK and across the world, the Right to Food movement needs to be anti-imperialist and call for debt cancellation and an end to the global economic order which punishes heavily indebted countries with additional debt, increases borrowing costs and exacerbates (rather than alleviates) onerous debt burdens – diverting valuable resources from investments in development, climate action, public services and eradicating food poverty.
Because the right to food is an inalienable right.
- Apsana Begum is the MP for Poplar and Limehouse and a regular contributor to Labour Outlook. You can follow Apsana on Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram and Tik Tok.
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