Last June, animal welfare organization Four Paws, based in Vienna, Austria, received a surprising call for help.
From Sudan, in the midst of a civil war between the regular army and the country's paramilitary group, workers at a wildlife refuge in the capital, Khartoum, asked for help to rescue their wild animals.
The request bordered on the impossible: it required entering the epicenter of the hostilities to try to get a dozen lions and hyenas out of there.
With hardly any communication routes open in Sudan, it took three months for the center's workers and the rescue team to obtain permits from the opposing parties for the operation, although the planning of all logistics depended on them.
By then, two-thirds of the shelter's 150 animals had died, due to disease, thirst and hunger.
Members of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces have also been accused of having eaten some.
The rest was in the bones.
“The animals were in very bad condition,” remembers veterinarian Amir Khalil, who led the mission.
“Nothing was working and no one could feed the animals;
There was no food, no water, no electricity,” he recalls, noting that “during the war, many of the animals even began to eat each other.”
We had to act quickly.
One of the cages during its transfer from Khartoum.Hristo Vladev
At the end of November, the team led by Khalil managed to reach the sanctuary and place almost 50 specimens in several cages manufactured shortly before in a port city in the country.
Their initial plan was to rescue 15 lions and five hyenas, but at the last minute they decided to also take around thirty individuals of other species that they had not previously been told about, including two eagles, a stork, gazelles, and deer. and wild cats.
From the south of Khartoum, and with the noise of fighting in the background, the delegation headed towards Wad Madani, the capital of another Sudanese state called Gezira.
The main difficulty of the trip was crossing the no-man's land that separates the front lines, a territory of about eight kilometers where crime reigns.
The intention was to make the journey during the day, so that it would be less unsafe, but the additional workload delayed them and they had to set off at dusk, when night was falling.
Khalil chose the option that seemed safest to him: he ordered the driver of the minibus in which his team was traveling to speed up to leave the area as quickly as possible, and wait for the two trucks that were transporting the animals in the first town under the control of the army.
“In my experience, no one will steal lions: who will stop a big truck to steal lions?” explains Khalil, known as the war veterinarian.
The first truck with the animals arrived shortly after the team in charge of the evacuation stopped at the agreed point, but the second was delayed because it was attacked by a group of criminals who stole the driver's money and phone.
The beasts, however, were fine.
At the end of the trip, the animals were divided.
Some were released, others were relocated to a national park near the Ethiopian border and the rest stayed in another national park in Gezira.
Once settled, Khalil stayed for several days to monitor their progress, and in mid-December, when he believed they were safe in their new home, he said goodbye to them and left.
Just a few hours later, the Egyptian received a call: the paramilitaries had just launched a surprise offensive on Gezira, and in just a few days they took control of the entire state with hardly any opposition.
That's how the Four Paws team found themselves traveling back to Sudan in January, with the mission to once again rescue animals evacuated from Khartoum.
But since entering Gezira was too dangerous, due to the volatility of the situation, this time a different plan was chosen: Sudanese officials were in charge of moving the beasts to the state of Gedaref, past the front east of Gezira, and there would be collected.
The condition of the animals at this point was critical: the lions had open wounds and injuries that required immediate attention.
They were visibly weak.
“A lion can hear 150 times more than we can, so if a bomb explodes next to me, the lion will hear it louder;
and there are birds that can smell 12 kilometers away.
So they were traumatized, they feel more than people,” says Khalil.
Once they were reunited with the animals, Khalil's team had to reach Port Sudan, which currently serves as a provisional capital under army control and has the only active commercial airport in Sudan.
The flight out of the country, however, was not scheduled for two days.
So, to spare them the suffocating heat of the Red Sea, the group chose to stop in a town located 900 meters above sea level, which was surprised by the unexpected visit of the felines.
One of the cats leaves its cage during one of the transfers.
Hristo Vladev
From Port Sudan, 15 lions, four hyenas and a wild cat boarded a cargo plane that finally took them out of the country towards the Jordanian reserve of Al Mawa, the largest wildlife sanctuary in the Middle East, located north of the capital of the country, Amman.
The morning after landing, one of the lions died.
“He was the leader, the big guy who took care of his entire family and made them safe.
He suffered all the time, but he did not give up until he landed in Jordan and spent one night,” says Khalil.
In mid-February, 11 of the lions undertook what should be their last journey, from Jordan to distant South Africa, where they have been able to start a new life in a big cat sanctuary with an area equivalent to 1,600 football fields.
More than 100 animals live there, including lions, tigers and leopards, along with other species typical of the area that live in freedom, such as zebras, antelopes and a wide variety of birds.
“You can already see the difference: the sun, the peace, the energy, good food, care;
It changed them immediately,” says Khalil.
“The best remedy for these animals is nature,” he observes.
The hyenas, the wildcat and three lions are still being cared for in Jordan.
In Sudan, the sides are locked in a war that has devastated the country, killed thousands of people, displaced millions and caused one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.
Far from the danger of Khartoum, the Egyptian veterinarian believes that the warring parties should take note of this evacuation mission.
“Animals can unite,” he notes.
“If they were able to do this for lions or hyenas, can't we really meet again?”
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