A doctor who split his time practicing in Iowa and Sudan has been killed. He was stabbed to death in front of his parents, wife and two children when trying to escape the unrest in Sudan.
49-year-old Bushra Sulieman was fatally stabbed outside of his Sudan residence. The U.S. doctor had been treating those wounded in the fighting in the days leading up to his death.
Dr. Suliema, a professor at the University of Khartoum, was in Sudan to train other doctors. He is a dual national of the U.S. and Sudan and would practice medicine back and forth between Iowa and Africa.
He is the second known American to die in the midst of Sudan’s upheaval.
The doctor is among hundreds of lives lost in Sudan in recent weeks amid fighting between two military commanders in the African nation.
As the U.S. government works to evacuate private Americans, the United Nations is now warning of a massive refugee crisis stemming from the battle over the region.
Hundreds of thousands of people have already been displaced due to the violence. The U.N. says 800,000 more could flee Sudan if the fighting continues. This would put more strain on neighboring countries already taking in hundreds of thousands of people.
International efforts to garner a peace deal between the two sides are growing more urgent as Sudan reaches what the U.N. describes as a “breaking point.”
A top U.N. aid says what was a humanitarian crisis in the region is now a full blown catastrophe.
