My recent visit to Sudan was a first for me, and I was eager to learn more about the situation on the ground there. My initial impressions can be summed up in these words: poor, few educational opportunities, little or no infrastructure, hopeful people, birth of a new nation, and highly reliant on outside support. I took this picture in the capital of southern Sudan -- Juba -- at the site of a recent IDP camp that had been destroyed by the government to force people back to their homes and land.
Despite the relative peace that has come to southern Sudan over the past couple of years, there remains significant conflict in the region. A recent article in the Economist states that violent conflict has killed more people in recent months in south Sudan than in Darfur. The article states that "the south is now slipping back into its pristine state of widespread insecurity from which it was supposed to have been rescued by a peace deal in 2005. Most of the recent deaths in the south have been caused by inter-tribal fighting, usually linked to land rights. As the rainy season arrives in different parts of Africa’s largest country, so the traditional competition for the best grazing areas for cattle and other livestock becomes more intense."
Another Economist article on southern Sudan states that "since 90% of southern Sudan’s people live on less than $1 a day, tightening belts is not an option. They are as hungry, poorly educated and diseased as the ill-starred people of Darfur. ... The UN says 187,000 Southern Sudanese were displaced by tribal fighting last year. This year the number may double." Sudan’s president, Omar al-Bashir, who was recently indicted by the International Criminal Court at The Hague for alleged crimes in Darfur, is nervous about the possibility of Southern Sudan's president, Salva Kiir, running as a candidate for the national presidency. And in 2011 the Southern Sudanese will conduct a national referendum to determine if they want to secede from Sudan to form an independent country, probably to be called New Sudan.
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