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Scoop
3 days ago
- Health
- Scoop
As Displacement Surges In South Sudan, Regional Humanitarian Crisis Deepens
03 June Violence between armed groups in Upper Nile state and other flashpoints has crippled essential services, triggered food insecurity and worsened disease outbreaks, including cholera – forcing some to be displaced repeatedly. Roughly 65,000 have been internally displaced in Upper Nile state alone. Access to aid in conflict hotspots is limited, with fighting and movement restrictions cutting off assistance. Lifesaving supplies, including medicine and healthcare to curb rising cholera cases, have halted, while rains threaten to worsen the crisis, flooding roads and driving up transport costs. South Sudan has also absorbed over a million people fleeing conflict in Sudan. Regional crisis Another 103,000 South Sudanese have sought refuge in neighbouring countries, pushing the total number of South Sudanese refugees to 2.3 million. 'This emergency could not have come at a worse time,' said Mamadou Dian Balde, UNHCR's Regional Director for the East, Horn of Africa and Great Lakes region. 'Many of the refugees are seeking safety in countries which have challenges of their own or are already dealing with emergencies amidst ongoing brutal funding cuts, straining our ability to provide even basic life-saving assistance.' Despite the conflict in Sudan, 41,000 South Sudanese have sought refuge there – 26,000 in White Nile state, where over 410,000 South Sudanese already live, many repeatedly displaced due to ongoing violence in their host country. The surge in arrivals in Sudan has created an urgent need for additional space, while essential services are overwhelmed due to cholera outbreaks and ongoing security challenges. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), 23,000 have arrived amid the country's own insecurity. Some 21,000 South Sudanese have sought refuge in Ethiopia. Previously living in makeshift shelters along riverbanks near the border, new arrivals are now receiving UNHCR aid further from the border; however, infrastructure and services in the area remain severely overstretched, worsened by a cholera outbreak. Uganda, which hosts one million South Sudanese refugees, has taken in 18,000 since March – a 135 per cent year-on-year increase. Nearly 70 per cent are children; many forced to take longer and more hazardous routes to safety. Call for support UNHCR is providing refugees with critical relief items, documentation and specialised support to survivors of gender-based violence. But to provide necessary support for the next six months – including shelter, water, health and nutrition screening, as well as cash assistance – the agency requires $36 million. Calling for an immediate end to hostilities, UNHCR urged all parties to spare civilians further suffering. Unrest in Warrap state In related developments, the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) voiced deep concern over escalating intercommunal violence in Tonj East county, Warrap state, urging the Government to intervene and deploy security services to address the situation. The violence has been driven by attempts to recover stolen cattle and revenge for the previous loss of lives, resulting in more than 80 casualties, although the numbers are yet to be verified. UNMISS is intensively engaging with state and local authorities to calm the situation, in addition to increasing patrols, however peacekeepers are experiencing significant challenges reaching some of the impacted areas due to a proliferation of checkpoints manned by armed youth.
Arab News
08-03-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
'Alarming regression' in South Sudan, UN warns
The chair of the UN commission, Yasmin Sooka, said South Sudan was 'witnessing an alarming regression that could erase years of hard-won progress''Rather than fueling division and conflict, leaders must urgently refocus on the peace process'NAIROBI: South Sudan is in 'alarming regression' as clashes in recent weeks in the northeast threaten to undo years of progress toward peace, the UN commission on human rights in the country warned on Saturday.A fragile power-sharing agreement between President Salva Kiir and First Vice President Riek Machar has been put in peril by the clashes between their allied forces in the country's Upper Nile Friday, a UN helicopter attempting to rescue soldiers in the state was attacked, killing one crew member and wounding two army general was also killed in the failed rescue mission, the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) said incident sent shudders through the young and impoverished nation, long plagued by political instability and late Friday urged calm and pledged no return to a statement on Saturday, the chair of the UN commission, Yasmin Sooka, said South Sudan was 'witnessing an alarming regression that could erase years of hard-won progress.''Rather than fueling division and conflict, leaders must urgently refocus on the peace process, uphold the human rights of South Sudanese citizens, and ensure a smooth transition to democracy,' she Sudan, the world's youngest country, ended a five-year civil war in 2018 with the power-sharing agreement between bitter rivals Kiir and Kiir's allies have accused Machar's forces of fomenting unrest in Nasir County, in Upper Nile State, in league with the so-called White Army, a loose band of armed youths in the region from the same ethnic Nuer community as the vice president.'What we are witnessing now is a return to the reckless power struggles that have devastated the country in the past,' commissioner Barney Afako said in the UN Commission added that the South Sudanese had endured 'atrocities, rights violations which amount to serious crimes, economic mismanagement, and ever worsening security.''They deserve respite and peace, not another cycle of war.'
