(Ottawa) Ottawa is offering a lifeline to people who want to flee Sudan’s escalating civil war and who have relatives in Canada who agree to support them financially.
Federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller stressed that this new humanitarian pathway is aimed at both Sudanese citizens and other foreign citizens who were living in the northeast African country when the conflict broke out. , in mid-April.
The program applies to individuals who are either a child, grandchild, parent, grandparent, sibling of a Canadian citizen or permanent resident.
These relatives must agree to support them financially, even if Ottawa has not specified the amount that this would require.
Interested individuals must apply for the program and complete typical security and biometric checks used for visa applicants, such as fingerprinting.
Dueling militias sparked a civil war in Sudan this spring that sent some five million people fleeing, many of them already refugees from neighboring countries.
A week ago, the United Nations Office for the Prevention of Genocide asked countries to speak out about what it called the rise in ethnically motivated violence in the country, which includes killings and attacks against civilians.
Mr. Miller addressed this situation in a press release on Thursday.
“The conflict raging in Sudan as well as the humanitarian situation on the ground remain deeply worrying,” acknowledged the minister.
“Canada will continue to help those in need and honor its humanitarian tradition as a country. This humanitarian path will make it possible to reunite loved ones and save lives,” he argued.
Sudan’s war began in mid-April after months of tensions between military leader Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and Commander Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
The two generals led a military coup in October 2021 that derailed Sudan’s short-lived transition to democracy following a popular uprising that forced the removal of President Omar al-Bashir in April 2019 .
The conflict in Sudan has destroyed the country and killed up to 9,000 people in October, according to the United Nations. However, activists and doctors’ groups say the real toll is much higher.
More than seven million people have been forced to leave their homes, with more than 1.5 million seeking refuge in neighboring countries, according to UN figures.
Canada has already allocated 165 million in humanitarian aid to people affected by this conflict, and has also accelerated immigration applications and waived fees for some people who fled the war.
With information from the Associated Press