“South Sudan should ensure that the restriction on barges in River Nile which transports vital life-saving supplies is lifted without delay”, UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Stephen O’Brien said at a press conference in South Sudan’s capital Juba.
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Families have endured horrendous atrocities ” including killing, abduction, and the recruitment of children into armed groups.
A compromise peace deal for South Sudan got off to a shaky start Tuesday as a government spokesman said his side would reject the agreement if it includes any new conditions, even as an expanded mediation team was invited to add to or change the agreement. Boys have been viciously attacked and mutated, girls as young as the age of 8 have been gang raped and murdered, and everyone is subject to gruesome deaths like being burned alive. Many people are starving, living in swamps or in bushes, hiding in fear of their lives.
The described as “senseless” the cycle of violence, saying it must be brought to a halt.
And in the rainy season they are in right now, about 70 percent of the country – about 7.9 million of the 11.6 million population – are facing extreme food scarcity.
Yesterday, the Under Secretary-General visited a UN civilian protection site in Juba, where some 20,000 people are sheltered, some for up to 19 months.
According to the UN, the humanitarian consequences of the conflict in South Sudan are grave.
War has forced 2.2 million people to flee their homes, with over 600,000 of those now refugees in the neighbouring nations of Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan and Uganda.
“If we don’t have peace, there will be more humanitarian need, more humanitarian crisis”. The humanitarian chief also called on the global community to respond quickly to the humanitarian needs of the country in order to “avert an even greater humanitarian tragedy”.
The security situation in South Sudan has deteriorated steadily over the past year since political in-fighting between President Kiir and his former Vice-President, Riek Machar, and their respective factions erupted in December 2013. The hostilities subsequently turned into a full-fledged conflict, resulting in reported atrocities and possible war crimes.
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Negotiations between the Government of South Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-in-Opposition (SPLM-IO) being brokered by the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) are set to resume on 24 July after a four month hiatus.
