“The violence in July came as a major setback to peace efforts in South Sudan“, the UNHCR spokesman Leo Dobbs said in a statement.
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Humanitarian organizations say they are finding it very hard for logistical, security and funding reasons in providing urgent protection and assistance to the hundreds of thousands in need, including 1.61 million internally displaced people. Most people fleeing are women and children.
Kiir, whose official salary is $60 thousand per year, owns a grand estate in neighboring Kenya, while Machar has reportedly tried to sell the country’s oil to a Russian arms dealer in exchange for weaponry, Clooney said.
The majority of refugees registered with the UNHCR crossed the border into Uganda (a total of 143,164 people), and others went to Kenya, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Central African Republic (CAR). Over the past week alone, Uganda recorded more than 20,000 new arrivals from its neighbor, the United Nations agency said.
Last August Khartoum and Juba said that First Vice President Taban Deng Gai discussed during his meetings with the Sudanese officials the presence of rebel group in South Sudan and pledged to take tangible measures within three weeks.
According to the agency, with this sombre milestone, South Sudan is now the fourth country in the world with more than one million refugees.
South Sudan won its independence in July 2011 after its separation from Sudan following a civil war that lasted 25 years.
Numerous worldwide attempts to reach a truce between the warring sides have failed.
In the wake of heavy fighting in South Sudan’s capital Juba in July, the 15-member council last month authorized a regional protection force as part of the United Nations peacekeeping mission and threatened to consider an arms embargo if Kiir’s government did not cooperate or stop hindering the movement of peacekeepers.
But Machar fled again this year to an undisclosed location when fighting broke out between his forces and Kiir’s in July.
The UAE is to fly more than 100 tonnes of essential supplies to Uganda to help an estimated 60,000 refugees in desperate need.
Sudan said on Sunday it would close its border with South Sudan within days if its neighbour did not expel militant groups, the government told state media. “Many children have lost one or both of their parents, some forced to become primary caregivers to younger siblings”, said Dobbs.
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The economy of the world’s youngest nation is in shambles thanks to recurring civil unrest, even as President Kiir’s government continues its notoriority to overspend on its political and military elite.
