South Sudan: Relief efforts obstructed by recrudescent violence

Juba, 8 February 2017 – A recent resurgence of violence and fighting in different areas in South Sudan is hindering relief organisations from delivering much-needed life-saving aid. This has led relief organisation Medair to withdraw staff from three different locations in the country last week.

“We are very concerned about the rapidly worsening security situation. New waves of heavy fighting are threatening the lives of thousands of civilians and forcing them to flee once again,” says Sander Brouwer, Medair’s Deputy Country Director in South Sudan. “To protect our staff, we sadly had to reduce the size of three of our nine field teams providing critical, life-saving care to people in urgent need of humanitarian assistance. Through local contacts and the courageous efforts of our reduced teams, we are able to keep programmes running to a certain extent.”

While renewed fighting and hostilities are limiting access for relief organisations, humanitarian needs in South Sudan are higher than ever before. Some 1.85 million people have been internally displaced and 1.4 million have fled across the border into neighbouring countries. Making matters worse, the conflict has prevented crops from being planted and harvested, and food prices have continued to increase rapidly. South Sudan is facing unprecedented levels of food and nutrition insecurity, with 4.9 million people projected to be severely food-insecure by July this year.

“Relocating our staff has been a difficult decision as we know that in many places people are almost fully dependent on humanitarian aid services. As the security situation allows, we will continue providing vital assistance at reduced capacity in the conflict-affected locations. We are committed to returning to full capacity as soon as safe access can be assured,” recounts Sander, “and we hope that will happen soon.”

Medair is assisting hundreds of thousands of people in South Sudan through health, nutrition, water, sanitation, hygiene, and emergency shelter services.

Medair’s South Sudan programme is supported by the European Commission, the United States Agency for International Development, South Sudan Humanitarian Fund, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), UK aid from the UK government, Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in partnership with Tear NL and through the Dutch Relief Alliance Joint Response for South Sudan, and private donors.

This release was produced with resources gathered by Medair field and headquarters staff. The views expressed herein are those solely of Medair and should not be taken, in any way, to reflect the official opinion of any other organisation.

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FAO. 31 January 2017. South Sudan situation report. http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/user_upload/emergencies/docs/FAO_SouthSudan_Situation_Update_31_Jan_2017.pdf