South Sudan

Baroness Cox Excerpts

Monday 24th March 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Cox (CB)]

My Lords, I warmly congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, on securing this very timely debate and on his comprehensive introduction of it. As I have recently returned from a visit to South Sudan with the Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust, I will highlight three aspects of our visit: the continuing problems and suffering resulting from the failure to secure agreement on Abyei; the escalating humanitarian crisis in Bahr el Ghazal and Warrap state; and the prerequisites for an effective peace process.

Our visit began in Agok, near to Abyei, where we met senior representatives of the Ngok Dinka community. Their situation remains cause for deep concern. Abyei town is still devastated; the continuing refusal of the Khartoum Government to remove their military forces maintains a reign of terror, so civilians cannot return to their homes; the murder with impunity last year of the paramount chief has left deep scars; and the failure of the international community to fulfil obligations for a referendum created such frustration that the local community organised their own, with an overwhelming mandate for joining South Sudan. Sadly, recent weeks have seen an increase in violent attacks, with many more civilian casualties reported. There is also a justifiable fear that the conflict which has erupted in South Sudan will deflect the attention of the international community from the urgent requirement to address the continuing needs and suffering of the people of Abyei.

We then visited Man-Angui camp, where nearly 5,000 internally displaced people are living in horrendous conditions. Warrap state and Bahr el Ghazal have been inundated with thousands of civilians fleeing from the conflict in Abyei, from Khartoum’s continuing genocidal bombardment in the Nuba mountains and in Blue Nile, and, most recently, from the tragic eruption of conflict in South Sudan. Many are without any humanitarian aid, living in flimsy cardboard shelters which will disintegrate with the imminent heavy rains; some have no shelter at all. There is such a shortage of food that people are forced to eat leaves with no nutritional value. For many, there is no health care, so pregnant women are giving birth with no midwives or access to clinical intervention if needed. The current crisis in these parts of South Sudan is becoming another catastrophe. The rains will bring even more disease, worsened sanitation, famine and severe challenges for access for humanitarian assistance as more than half the country becomes impassable. What support is being given by DfID to address this critical situation in this part of South Sudan?

The urgent need for a genuine peace process is intensified by Khartoum’s continuing genocidal policies in Darfur as well as Blue Nile and South Kordofan, where it has ruthlessly tripled aerial bombardment while the international community’s attention has been focused on the conflict in South Sudan. February saw the highest number of civilians killed or injured in South Kordofan since the current conflict began in 2011, with the number of fatalities more than double those recorded in January. The Sudanese Air Force is now employing even more sophisticated weaponry against civilians, including upgraded aircraft.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network argues that food insecurity in South Kordofan will reach emergency levels by April. In Blue Nile state there is even less humanitarian assistance. When we visited there last year, many hundreds of people had already died of hunger. What are the British Government doing to try to help humanitarian assistance reach these civilians before hunger and disease claim many more hundreds of lives in South Kordofan and Blue Nile?

The proposed peace process needs to meet the complex realities on the ground, as the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, emphasised so well. As the conflict erupted, myriad locally focused groups in north-eastern South Sudan—only some of them Nuer—took up arms against President Salva Kiir in order to protest localised grievances. While those groups have grievances against the president, only a small minority support Riek Machar. However, in mid-March 2014, when IGAD announced the formation of the Protection Deterrent Force—PDF—for South Sudan, Riek Machar announced that “his forces” would not co-operate with the PDF.

Therefore, for a genuine conflict resolution process to be effective, the complex reality must be recognised and addressed. First, the diverse grievances of the myriad grassroots groups must be studied, understood and resolved. That process should be conducted separately with each group, with cessation of violence as a precondition for such discussions. There is no other way to stop the fratricidal violence that currently plagues so much of South Sudan.

The second phase can come only when violence has subsided, making it possible to engage in meaningful discussions with all the key political forces in South Sudan—not just President Kiir and Riek Machar—about governance reforms and the political future of the nation. President Kiir has outlined an excellent eight-point road map for a return to peace and moving the country forward, which needs to be considered by the international community, although there is no comparable proposition from Riek Machar or any other opposition groups.

Having just returned from a heartbreaking visit where we witnessed first-hand the massive scale of suffering, I urge Her Majesty’s Government to fulfil their continuing responsibility, as a member of the troika, to support a realistic, just peace process, essential for urgent action to alleviate the current catastrophes; to prevent escalation of yet more conflict; and to ensure that the Government in Khartoum do not take advantage of the conflict in South Sudan to escalate their ruthless assaults on their own people. The United Kingdom has a responsibility to bring some hope to people in both nations, Sudan and South Sudan, who have suffered too much for far too long. I sincerely hope that the Minister will provide that hope this evening.