Refugee crisis in Sudan’s dirty war

FIRST they ate leaves, then roots soaked for days and boiled until they were almost edible. Now many have eaten their planting seed, and their future with it.

There is no food in the Nuba Mountains, so the stream of tens of thousands of hungry refugees pouring across the militarised Sudan-South Sudan border has almost doubled in two months.

The camp at Yida now holds 31,000 refugees and is braced for thousands more, as desperate families rush to make the five-day trek south from Sudan on foot before the rains arrive, turning dirt roads to mud, choking off food deliveries for months.

Back in their homeland, the refugees have endured bombardment from Sudan warplanes and a food shortage they blame on president Omar al-Bashir. Aid groups say Sudan – a mostly Arab nation – is trying to starve the black residents of the Nuba Mountains. Refugees report the deaths of young and old.

“There’s no food where we live. People are eating the leaves of trees,” said Amira Tia, who arrived at the camp last week after walking in flip flops for four days with her four children.

“Every morning they go to the bush to collect leaves. There is also a root of a tree that if you soak it for five days and then boil it, it is edible,” she said.

Sudan does not allow international aid into Nuba, and no official assessments have been done.

Geoffrey Pinnock, the World Food Programme’s emergency officer in Yida, said: “We hear from refugees things are bad and getting worse. Some people haven’t had solid food in two months and then walk five days to reach the camp.”

Muniara Kamal walked for six days, carrying her nine-month-old daughter, Safa. Tia said the group she was walking with was twice attacked by Sudanese Antonov bombers. One man was cut in half by shrapnel, she said.

When South Sudan voted to break from Sudan last year after decades of war, the people of the Nuba Mountains were caught in the middle. They are black, not Arabs like the northerners of Sudan.

Now a full-on war is under way in their homeland. Even once they reach the camp, the threat of war remains. South Sudan’s military is on alert in case border skirmishes escalate.

The Yida camp is far more militarised than aid workers would like. South Sudan troops move through, as do northern rebels. Aid workers say rebels use the camp for food and rest. International aid groups have dug foxholes in their compounds in case Sudan bombs again.

The rate of new arrivals has risen rapidly in recent days. Aid workers and Nuba leaders say 15,000 or even 30,000 more Nuba could reach Yida in the coming weeks. With the rains expected in June, WFP is rushing to deliver 5,000 tonnes of food.

The camp has a dirt airfield, but the rains threaten to make it unusable. Goods could be parachuted in or dropped by helicopter, but both methods are expensive for a large camp.

The UN wants the Yida residents to move to two camps farther south, but most prefer to be closer to home – and to the tree cover that provides protection from the merciless sun.

Hussein Algumbulla, chief representative for camp residents, said the Nuba hated asking for help. “We need only scythes and next year we can say to WFP, you can come buy food from us.”