WUNRN
IDP
News Alert, 23 October 2008 - Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre
Sudan:
Incomplete Peacekeeping Force Struggles to Protect Darfur IDPs - Internally
Displaced Persons of Darfur
IDPs in
Darfur report
that international missions have not been able to protect them. Only 13,000 of
the planned 26,000 peacekeepers of the African Union and UN’s Hybrid Operation
in Darfur (UNAMID) have been deployed so far, including 7,200 armed soldiers
and three armed police units. According to UNAMID, providing security to IDPs
by organising wood gathering patrols and preventing attacks on IDP camps is
still beyond its capacity. The UN Secretary General recently said the mission
aims to reach 65 per cent deployment by the end of 2008, and 85 per cent by
March 2009. The challenge facing the Operation remains enormous.
_____________________________________________________________________
SUDAN:
Plight of Darfur's Displaced Worse Than Ever
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Women recently displaced by fighting in North Darfur: Some
300,000 people are estimated to have been newly displaced this year alone |
TAWILA, 21 October 2008 (IRIN) - As Sudan lobbies the
international community for support in its fight to ward off looming charges of
genocide against its president, arguing they would endanger the "great
strides" the government is making towards peace, people displaced by more
than five years of fighting in Darfur tell a different story.
"Since 2004 until today, there has been no
resolution. The problems have only gotten worse," said a sheikh at a camp
for displaced people in Tawila, 50km west of El-Fasher, state capital of North
Darfur. At the beginning of the conflict, he told IRIN, attacks – if intense –
were few and far between. "But now, weekly, there is a problem here.
Weekly, janjaweed [government-sponsored militias], weapons, rape,
looting."
The UN/African Union hybrid peacekeeping mission's base
in Tawila is a prime example. A metre-wide gap in its barbed razor wire is a
constant reminder of the day in May when the ruined town and the nearby camp
that houses most of Tawila’s residents came under attack. Desperate residents
forced their way onto the base's buffer zone, seeking the UN's protection.
Police at Tawila camp deny any involvement and insist
they are there for the protection of the displaced. The government blames the
continuation of the conflict on rebels who refuse to negotiate.
While analysts describe the current conflict as
"low-level", many displaced people say it is worse now than it has
ever been.
Fighting between government and rebel troops in
September saw attacks on villages reminiscent of the type of fighting that took
place at the height of the conflict in 2003-4. In villages near Tabit town in
North Darfur, burned houses, craters from bombs, and gun casings along the road
are just some indications. Some 300,000 are estimated to have been newly
displaced this year alone, according to the UN Office for Coordination of
Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
"The situation in Darfur is deteriorating," UN
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told journalists at a press conference on 7
October.
"People who have been here a long time say this
conflict is as bad now as it has ever been," one UN official added.
In another camp for displaced people in Zamzam, south of
El-Fasher, residents are still reeling from an attack on their camp on 10
September, when government police entered the camp, shot people and looted the
market.
"They pushed us out of our homes, and now they are
coming after us again," said Mohamed Ramadan, a resident at the camp.
"Before, you had some warning. You would hear the shooting early on, from
far. Now, there is no warning. They say peace has come; there is security. Then
all of a sudden, they enter."
Still, some say there is no comparison to 2003-4 when
most of the 2.5 million displaced people fled their homes after widespread
attacks on civilian villages. "But what has deteriorated," one aid
worker told IRIN, "is access of the humanitarian agencies to the people in
need. So the people's situation has deteriorated. People are more scared. They
don't trust anyone anymore."
Loss of Hope
But the displaced are not the only ones losing hope.
Humanitarian workers and international peacekeepers are
increasingly being directly targeted. On 6 October, a UN peacekeeper was killed
after an ambush on a peacekeeping patrol. He is the ninth peacekeeper to die in
Dafur in three months, according to the UN. This year, 170 humanitarian workers
have been kidnapped or abducted – 41 of them are still missing. In September,
17 humanitarian vehicles were hijacked and 21 aid compounds were broken-into or
attacked by armed men.
"At some point, there may need to be a line drawn,
saying we've had enough," Alex Gregory, head of OCHA in North Darfur
state, told IRIN. "It doesn't bode well that everyone has put so much
effort and we're still in the situation that we are in Darfur four years
[after] the conflict began.
"At some point, you just can't take anymore. Where
are we going with this?"
According to several UN sources, the humanitarian
community in Darfur is currently discussing what its pain threshold is and when
to walk away.
"We need to know where the line is. Until now, it's
been a line in the sand," said one senior UN official.
Still, he insisted that while the conflict continues,
"there have been amazing results in this aid operation…People are not
suffering unnecessarily because of a lack of relief."
But despite billions of dollars in aid and development
funding, the introduction of a 13,000-strong peacekeeping force and the threat
of an international arrest warrant against Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir,
there seem to be few signs of progress.
Humanitarians worry that with the end of the rainy
season, the end of the holy month of Ramadan, increased government troop
movement, the tactical unification of rebel groups and a looming decision by
the International Criminal Court on whether to grant the arrest warrant against
Bashir, things will only get worse.
And if and when the conflict does end, many wonder what
the impact will be on Sudan's social, ethnic and tribal structure. Strong
hatred has been created among tribal lines, traditional leaders have lost their
authority, and young people have become accustomed to life in towns and large
camps, making a return to their small villages unlikely.
"We've certainly not seen the end of it even if
ever the situation normalises," the aid worker said.
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