Here are some more details on the state­ment by aid groups on the pre­car­i­ous peace in Sudan. The peace is even more frag­ile as it came to light today that over 140 lives were claimed in recent vio­lence. The inci­dent was just dis­cov­ered today, but may have hap­pened a cou­ple of days ago. IRIN gives us full details on both stories.

Vio­lence in South­ern Sudan con­tin­ues to esca­late, with the lat­est inci­dent claim­ing 140 lives, even as 10 aid agen­cies called for urgent inter­na­tional inter­ven­tion to pre­vent a return to war between the north and south.

A senior UN offi­cial said on 7 Jan­u­ary that at least 140 peo­ple had been killed and 90 wounded dur­ing an attack on the Wun­chai region of War­rap state.

The fight occurred some time at the begin­ning of the year but reports emerged only after a UN secu­rity team vis­ited the remote area by air­plane two days ago.

“Local sources on the ground said at least 140 had been killed and 90 wounded,” said Lise Grande, the UN Deputy Res­i­dent and Human­i­tar­ian Coor­di­na­tor in South­ern Sudan.

Grande, who also said sev­eral thou­sand cat­tle had been stolen, added that a mil­i­tary team of UN peace­keep­ers had left on 7 Jan­u­ary by road to ascer­tain the exact sit­u­a­tion on the ground in the wider region.

“We are deeply con­cerned at these reports,” Grande said.

“Lethal cock­tail”

Details of the attack coin­cided with the launch of a report by 10 aid agen­cies who cau­tioned that the suc­cess­ful hold­ing of elec­tions and a ref­er­en­dum, civil­ian pro­tec­tion, as well as increased devel­op­ment fund­ing for South­ern Sudan, were cru­cial in pre­vent­ing a return to war five years after the sign­ing of the Com­pre­hen­sive Peace Agree­ment (CPA).

The agen­cies said the CPA was on the brink of col­lapse because of a “lethal cock­tail” of ris­ing vio­lence, chronic poverty and polit­i­cal tensions.

“A great deal hangs on what can be achieved in the next 365 days,” Richard Poole, direc­tor of human­i­tar­ian aid pro­grammes for the Inter­na­tional Res­cue Com­mit­tee (IRC) in South­ern Sudan, told a news con­fer­ence in Nairobi. “When the peace deal expires in a year, we must ensure that the chance for long-term peace and devel­op­ment in the region does not die with it.”

React­ing to the NGOs’ report, peo­ple on the streets of Juba, the South­ern Sudan cap­i­tal, said they feared for the future.

“War is a pos­si­bil­ity — we do not trust the north,” said Simon Akol, a small trader.

How­ever, senior offi­cials of the Sudan People’s Lib­er­a­tion Move­ment (SPLM), the rul­ing party in the south, said the risks were being exaggerated.

“Of course, we have prob­lems with secu­rity that require a lot of atten­tion, but we should not sim­ply always look at the neg­a­tive side of things,” said Anne Itto, the SPLM deputy secretary-general for the south.

“Of course we can do more, but we have come a long, long way since the peace deal was signed in 2005,” Itto added. “We have a gov­ern­ment in place, as well as roads, insti­tu­tions and roads being built, as well as a polit­i­cal space that has been created.

“Much needs to be done but we are hope­ful for the future.”

Not too late

Maya Mailer, a pol­icy adviser for Oxfam and co-author of the NGOs’ report, said in a state­ment: “It is not yet too late to avert dis­as­ter, but the next 12 months are a cross­roads for Africa’s largest coun­try. Last year saw a surge in vio­lence in South­ern Sudan. This could esca­late even fur­ther and become one of the biggest emer­gen­cies in Africa in 2010.”

Accord­ing to the agen­cies, at least 2,500 peo­ple were killed in 2009 and 350,000 fled their homes, “a human toll greater than occurred last year in Dar­fur”. They said the rest of the world had largely over­looked this suffering.

The report warned of sev­eral pos­si­ble flash­points over the next 12 months includ­ing pres­i­den­tial, leg­isla­tive and local elec­tions in April – the first in 24 years – and a ref­er­en­dum in early 2011 on whether South­ern Sudan becomes independent.

Warn­ing that grow­ing frus­tra­tion over the lack of devel­op­ment in South­ern Sudan was harm­ing the chance for peace, the agen­cies noted that less than half the pop­u­la­tion had access to clean water and mater­nal mor­tal­ity rates were among the worst in the world.

“There are fewer than 50km of tar­mac road in the entire region, an area the size of France, and dur­ing heavy rains many areas are cut off for months at a time, mak­ing the deliv­ery of human­i­tar­ian aid almost impos­si­ble,” the report stated. “Some 80 per­cent of adults can­not read or write and one in seven chil­dren dies before their fifth birthday.”

Fran­cisco Roque, the coun­try direc­tor of Save the Chil­dren in South­ern Sudan, said: “After five years of peace, South­ern Sudan remains one of the poor­est regions on earth. Peo­ple hoped the peace would bring eco­nomic ben­e­fits and devel­op­ment, but this has hap­pened far too slowly and in some areas not at all. We are very wor­ried about chil­dren who seem to be increas­ingly tar­geted in attacks on vil­lages. Inter­na­tional donors and the gov­ern­ment must urgently improve aid to these areas.”

A return to con­flict would have dev­as­tat­ing con­se­quences that extend far beyond South­ern Sudan, the agen­cies said. This cri­sis was esca­lat­ing at a time when the sit­u­a­tion in Dar­fur, in west­ern Sudan, remains one of the world’s biggest human­i­tar­ian emer­gen­cies. They warned that there could not be sus­tain­able peace in Dar­fur if the peace between north and south was allowed to fail.

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