Sudanese government mobilizes international aid agencies to provide emergency relief to arrivals.
Some 20,000 Eritrean refugees have fled into Sudan since the middle of last week, crossing four entry points as Ethiopian forces pushed into Eritrea. Aid workers said an estimated 5,000 Eritreans had crossed the Sudanese border into Gerghef and that more people were arriving at noon Sunday from Tesseney in Eritrea just across the border from eastern Sudan. The latest arrivals said that Tesseney, which had a population of more than 20,000 people, was practically empty. Sudanese officials have also identified a camp site nearby to accommodate the refugees at both Lofa and Gulsa, a region where there is no vegetation and where it is extremely hot during this time of year. Most of the early arrivals came on trucks, cars, carts, camels and donkeys, carrying all sorts of belongings.