South Sudan: the particularly dangerous security context for humanitarian workers in Jonglei
Displaced South Sudanese in Jonglei State in 2015 (illustration image).
AFP PHOTO / CHARLES LOMODONG
Text by: RFI Follow
2 mins
Three dead and one injured in the attack on a United Nations convoy carrying food aid, Thursday, March 24 in South Sudan, in the state of Jonglei.
This new attack comes as the country has this year nearly 8.3 million people who need the support of the World Food Program to survive.
South Sudan remains one of the most dangerous countries in the world for humanitarians.
They are 132 to have lost their life in mission since the independence of the country in 2011. The State of Jongleï is particularly dangerous, with already 4 attacks of humanitarian convoys reported since the beginning of the year.
Advertising
Read more
With our correspondent in Juba,
Florence Miettaux
The 44-truck convoy was ambushed between Gadiang and Yuai villages in Jonglei state.
The looters "
executed
" three of the employees of the private company chartered by the World Food Program and stole the equivalent of $3.2 million worth of food.
Arafat Jamal is the acting humanitarian coordinator in South Sudan;
he is waiting for the results of the investigation to understand what happened, even if extreme poverty is for him the cause of this violence.
"
I think that on the one hand it is linked to the violence that continues in this state.
But the region where this attack took place is really at the center of the climate crisis, I visited quite a few villages there myself, these are villages that are completely under water, total flooding, so the needs are extreme.
Personally, I find it very difficult to see how one can live in villages like that, without fields and without cattle either, cattle being very important in this country.
And it's true that 44 trucks is a fairly visible target for people who don't have food, they think it's perhaps easy to attack them.
»
Jonglei State also experiences repeated cycles of armed violence between Dinka, Nuer and Murle communities.
At the end of January, clashes left 32 dead.
The humanitarian community estimates that 1.7 million people need food assistance in this part of the country.
►
To read also:
FAO and the World Bank in South Sudan to revive agriculture there
Newsletter
Receive all the international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
South Sudan
Humanitarian
Poverty