Geneva ? The U.N. food agency said Friday it is cutting rations in half for about 3 million refugees in Sudan’s war-ravaged Darfur region because of a shortage of money, calling it “scandalous” that it has to stretch out supplies while it pleads for funds.

The World Food Program said it would reduce food handouts to 1,050 calories a person starting Monday – down from the 2,100 calories that is considered the daily minimum requirement.

“This is one of the hardest decisions I have ever made. Haven’t the people of Darfur suffered enough?” said James Morris, the U.N. program’s chief.

About 180,000 people have been killed and 3 million driven from their homes by fighting in the western Sudanese region since February 2003, when rebels from black farming villages took up arms against what they consider discrimination and oppression by the Arab-dominated government.

Sudanese government leaders allegedly encouraged militiamen from nomadic Arab tribes to wage a campaign of murder, rape and arson against civilians in the villages, and the international community poured in help in 2005 while pressuring both sides to settle the conflict.

“What is deeply disturbing is that these funding shortages threaten the gains made last year by humanitarian agencies in Darfur, where malnutrition levels went down by half,” Morris said. “We were making great progress.”

Donor governments have given the World Food Program only $238 million of the $746 million the agency needs this year for the whole of Sudan, said WFP spokeswoman Christiane Berthiaume.