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Without critical action, nearly 230,000 children and new mothers in conflict-ravaged Sudan are “likely to die from hunger”, Save the Children warned on Wednesday.

Nearly 11 months of fighting between the forces of two rival generals has killed thousands and displaced eight million people in the northeast African country, the United Nations says.

The bombing and destruction of fields and factories have plunged Sudan into “one of the worst” nutrition situations in the world, said Arif Noor, Save the Children’s country director in Sudan.

“Nearly 230,000 children, pregnant women, and new mothers could die in the coming months,” the British non-governmental organization said.

The charity said, “More than 2.9 million children in Sudan are acutely malnourished and an additional 729,000 children under five are suffering from severe acute malnutrition — the most dangerous and deadly form of extreme hunger”.

It warned that “about 222,000 severely malnourished children and more than 7,000 new mothers are likely to die” under the current levels of funding which “only covers 5.5 percent” of Sudan’s total needs.

The United Nations World Food Programme sounded the alarm on Sudan this month, warning the war risked triggering the world’s largest hunger crisis.

The conflict, which experts have warned could last years, is being fought between Sudan’s army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, his former deputy and commander of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).