Islam Musa lay in the corner of bed number six as her
grandmother, Zena Bade, fed her milk through a tube.
Stalked by hunger and aerial bombardment, the pair were
among the tens of thousands of people who have been driven from
their home in Sudan's Blue Nile state across the border into
South Sudan's Doro refugee camp. For months, Bade said, they had
survived on nothing but leaves and tree roots.
"The government soldiers came and chased us away from our
village and took away our sorghum," she said, speaking in the
white medical tent where her granddaughter lay. "We hid in the
bush."
grandmother, Zena Bade, fed her milk through a tube.
Stalked by hunger and aerial bombardment, the pair were
among the tens of thousands of people who have been driven from
their home in Sudan's Blue Nile state across the border into
South Sudan's Doro refugee camp. For months, Bade said, they had
survived on nothing but leaves and tree roots.
"The government soldiers came and chased us away from our
village and took away our sorghum," she said, speaking in the
white medical tent where her granddaughter lay. "We hid in the
bush."
Their plight encapsulates the human toll of a war that has
convulsed Sudan's border states since South Sudan became an
independent country over the summer, throwing a spotlight on a
conflict that is complicating efforts to resolve issues such as
oil revenue sharing between Sudan and the South.
Sudan's division initially overshadowed the fighting, but
warnings of impending famine from the United States and
activists such as Hollywood actor George Clooney have refocused
attention on the conflict.
Limited access to the border regions makes it hard to
accurately assess the war's impact. But the United Nations
estimates that over 410,000 people have fled their homes in Blue
Nile and South Kordofan, another border state.
Aid workers and refugees in Doro camp, where some 45,000
people have fled, say food stocks in Blue Nile are likely to run
out in the next couple of weeks.
"The area is a war zone now. The traders are not going
there. There is not anything coming from outside. What the
people have there now is finishing," Doro camp supervisor Sila
Musa said, standing in the baking sun. "They depend on the roots
of the trees and the fruits of the trees."
Musa, former commissioner of Kurmuk county in Blue Nile,
estimated that up to 100,000 people may be trapped in the state,
unable to leave because they cannot carry the food and water
they would need for a journey that can take as long as a month.
Like many of Khartoum's critics, he said the bombing
campaign was deliberately designed to cause hunger, scatter
civilians and deprive the guerrillas of a support network.
"It becomes just like a weapon because if people do not eat,
they are going to die. The same as if you are using a gun, you
are going to kill the person. There is no difference," he said.
Sudan regularly denies such charges, saying the armed forces
are working to protect civilians and that it is the rebels who
have been responsible for any humanitarian suffering.
Khartoum has also dismissed fears of a looming famine.
Daffa-Alla Elhag Ali Osman, its U.N. ambassador, has described
the humanitarian situation in South Kordofan and Blue Nile as
"very normal."
Last week, the United Nations said it had made some progress
in talks with Sudan to deliver more aid to South Kordofan, but
said it wanted more access.
ANGER SIMMERS IN CAMPS
Bombardment in Blue Nile and dire conditions in the refugee
camps have pushed many young men to consider joining the rebels.
"There is nothing left there," Nathanial Yahia, 26, said,
squatting in the dust to play Bau, a game using stones and a
board hewn from the back earth. "We young people, we are now
very angry because (our) mothers and fathers are not in a good
situation."
He described his fields across the border, where he said
Antonov aircraft bombed day and night.
"Because of the Antonovs, everybody now wants to help the
(rebels), so that they can fight together, so that the people
can go back home to Blue Nile state. Living here is not free."
As with most of Sudan's conflicts, the roots of the wars in
Blue Nile and South Kordofan stretch back decades. Tens of
thousands of fighters in both states sided with the south during
a civil war against Khartoum that started in 1983.
A 2005 peace deal ended the fighting, clearing the way for
Sudan's partition in July, but it left the two states in the
north.
The pact offered residents of the states "popular
consultations" t o determine how they would interact with
Khartoum, but those talks were never completed.
In June, the Sudan People's Liberation Army-North (SPLA-N),
made up of a former division of the southern rebel army, began
fighting government forces in South Kordofan. Other SPLA-N
troops loyal to Blue Nile governor Malik Agar quickly took to
the bush when fighting spread to that state in September.
Khartoum and Juba have repeatedly accused one another of
backing rebels on either side of the border since then,
hindering talks over unresolved issues such as how much the
landlocked South should pay to use oil infrastructure in Sudan.
The talks became more urgent in January, when Juba shut down
its output of about 350,000 barrels per day after Khartoum began
siphoning off some oil to make up for what it called unpaid
fees. Crude production is the lifeblood of both economies.
South Sudan has since accused its northern neighbour of
"stealing" over 6 million barrels of crude and of bombing an oil
well close to their shared border, which Sudan denies doing.
After months of rancour, the two presidents are set to meet
next month to try to break the deadlock.
CLOONEY TO THE RESCUE?
Analysts say any deal will hinge on the two sides agreeing
to end what they describe as proxy wars that have displaced tens
of thousands of people like Islam and her grandmother.
There appears to have been some recent progress at the
talks, which have repeatedly collapsed in acrimony, though Sudan
watchers are cautious about raising hopes of a deal.
"I don't think they would be going ahead with the summit if
there wasn't some forward momentum on the outstanding issues,"
said Aly Verjee, an analyst at the Nairobi-based Rift Valley
Institute think tank.
Actor George Clooney was arrested in front of Sudan's
embassy in Washington D.C. last week, as he sought to draw
attention to the bombing campaign.
Some activists have praised the celebrity for publicising a
conflict that remains obscure for many Westerners. But others
have criticised what they view as his oversimplified depiction
of the conflict as Sudan's ruling Arab elite targeting black
Africans.
There are also concerns that Clooney's activism, which is
aimed at getting the United States to pressure Khartoum into
ending the "man-made tragedy," could damage talks at a critical
stage by making it harder for Washington to help broker a deal.
Whatever the impact of celebrity activism, international
awareness has come too late for Islam Musa in bed six.
Three days after the interview with her grandmother, she
died, becoming another statistic on the whiteboard of the Doro
refugee camp.
(Additional reporting and editing by Alexander Dziadosz;
Editing by Andrew Osborn)
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