Will Sudan’s violence cause a wave of refugees?

Germain Mwehu has been receiving non-stop calls from those in need in recent days as violence in Sudan between rival forces continues and civilian casualties rise.

Mwehu, who works for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in the capital Khartoum, recalls a phone call he received on Monday night.

It was from a Khartoum University student who told Mwehu that she was ill and disabled before pleading for the ICRC’s help to return to her home. The young woman has been stranded at the university since Saturday, when the conflict broke out.

“But we can’t do anything,” Mwehu told Al Jazeera.

“We can’t move, we can’t go out,” he insisted, adding that the university is close to army headquarters, where there is a lot of fighting.

That is the deadlock in which humanitarian organizations find themselves as fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) continues for a fifth day.

According to the United Nations, 185 people have been killed and another 1,800 injured so far.

But the death toll is likely to be higher as airports, homes, hospitals and power plants have not been spared aerial bombardment.

The situation could potentially trigger a looming refugee crisis, humanitarian organizations say, in a country already hosting refugees and displaced persons, and which is a neighbor of other conflict-affected countries.

Currently, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) does not expect movement of people outside Sudan, but rather within its borders.

“I don’t expect it to be just a massive refugee flow outside of Sudan because if you look at the conflict, it’s so localized to Khartoum and Darfur now,” Eatizaz Yousif, IRC’s Sudan country director told Al Jazeera.

“What I expect to see is an internal move from those two states to safer states,” she added, saying the IRC already sees that move happening.

Yet the possibility of refugee flows has other organizations ready.

While Mwehu says the ICRC has yet to see a movement of people leave Sudan, as a humanitarian organization it stands ready to support and respond if needed.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has also not yet received reports on the movement of refugees to neighboring countries, the group said in a statement Monday.

At present, there are few humanitarian organizations fully active in Sudan. The World Food Program suspended operations in Sudan on Sunday after three workers were killed in the western region of Darfur. The ICRC was also suspended on Monday because of the conflict.

The killing of the aid workers “endangered everything,” Karl Schembri, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s (NRC) regional media adviser, told Al Jazeera.

“Right now all my colleagues are in hibernation. It’s too unsafe to go outside,” he said.

The IRC, meanwhile, continues to operate in eastern Sudan and Blue Nile state, but has suspended operations in Khartoum. However, Yousif said the ongoing fighting in the capital would affect its operations elsewhere, as the group’s supplies are mainly stored there or pass through the city.

The organizations fear that the ongoing fighting will continue to put refugees and people already displaced in Sudan at risk.

These populations, mainly concentrated in the Darfur region, depend on humanitarian aid every day for things like food and water, Mwehu said.

“[Refugees] left the country because of a situation similar to what is happening in Sudan today,” said Mwehu, explaining that they fled neighboring countries such as South Sudan, Chad and Ethiopia, among others. “So it’s a dilemma for them.”

Yousif speculates that the only place outside the country for refugees to move to is in northern Egypt, given the conflict elsewhere.

People who fled and became displaced did so because of conflicts such as intercommunal violence, Mwehu said.

“So if they have to move again now, it’s very, very difficult,” he said.

As for civilians, like the university student Mwehu spoke to, it’s a matter of how long they can take the fight, he said. Many people remain stranded in places such as their homes, markets and the airport without food and water, while the sick in hospitals are denied medical attention, he said.

The ICRC’s plea, Mwehu said, is for warring parties to recall their “obligation to protect civilians” and their “obligation to facilitate the work of humanitarian organizations.”

On Tuesday, both sides in the conflict agreed to a 24-hour ceasefire, but fighting continued despite this.

Humanitarian aid workers are skeptical of the dueling generals’ promises to honor such ceasefires. An earlier ceasefire on Sunday was also widely ignored.

Yousif insisted that negotiations to end the conflict must gain momentum or the “human cost” will be too great.