Under a barrage of shelling, Haider Anur and his wife fled their home last year with five children in tow. The family did not have time to take anything with them.

They were among tens of thousands of civilians displaced when Sudanese forces took over Al-Azarak, an area in the conflict-torn South Kordofan in Sudan that is so fertile it feeds an entire county.

Some people might die of hunger, Anur worried at the time.

Over the past six years of war, Sudans attacks on farmland and civilian areas have driven up the need for humanitarian aid in this restive area of the Nuba Mountains. At the same time, the government has banned aid organizations from assisting the people there and even bombed those that operate despite the government ban.

But in the first time in six years, a chance of humanitarian aid reaching South Kordofan and Blue Nile conflict areas may be possible. Fighting between the Sudanese government and rebel forces is on hold amid a six-month ceasefire. Former U.S. President Barack Obama lifted economic sanctions against Sudan just before leaving office with a caveat that Sudan would desist military operations and allow humanitarian access to the war-affected areas.

But neither side can agree on how humanitarian aid should be delivered. With deep distrust of one another, the Khartoum government insists on cross-line humanitarian assistance emanating from Sudanese territory, while the Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) contends that at least some aid must come through adjacent countries. And while the political impasse continues, the UN estimates 600,000 people are in need from the war-affected areas in South Kordofan and neighboring Blue Nile state.

From the perspective of the Sudanese government, aid from abroad that they cant control is ostensibly a way for the rebels to smuggle arms and other materials, said Omer Ismail, a Sudanese humanitarian and activist. From the SPLM-N perspective, a government that kills its own people cannot be trusted to bring humanitarian assistance to these same victims. Every side has their own logic.