Displaced caught in the crossfire.

After suffering decades of civil war, recurrent drought and widespread inter-ethnic conflict, Sudan now hosts the largest number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the world - some 4 million people. The main cause of this unparalleled level of displacement has been, and continues to be, the civil war which has been fought since 1983 between the Khartoum government and southern rebels, including the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A). Not only are civilians caught in the crossfire between warring parties, but in more recent years "the military strategies embraced by both the government and the SPLA have often placed civilians directly in the firing line," the think-tank, International Crisis Group (ICG), said in a recent report. Government forces and their allied militias have frequently attacked civilian targets as part of an effort to weaken support for the SPLA, while the SPLA relies on guerrilla tactics against the government, according to ICG. In addition, bombing raids by government aircraft, such as the one in February on a relief distribution site at the village of Bieh, western Upper Nile (Wahdah State), widely condemned by aid agencies, governments and the UN, have wreaked havoc in some parts of southern Sudan, and forced civilians to flee into the bush seeking cover from aerial bombardment. The combined effect of militia attacks, bombing raids and mass evictions, often exacerbated during periods of drought, is to create a state of chronic insecurity and poverty, particularly among rural communities in the south. Over the years, this has led to a chronic population drain from the south towards the transition zone between north and south, and further north to the capital, Khartoum. Displacement in the north Khartoum and its surrounding area hosts an estimated 1.8 million IDPs, making up some 40 percent of its population, according to the Global IDP Database [see: www.idpproject.org]. The IDPs in Khartoum include large numbers of southerners who have fled conflict and drought in southern and south-central Sudan since the latest phase of civil war began in 1983, with others displaced by drought in the west. Only a minority - some 220,000 people - of Khartoum State's IDPs are housed in four official camps, located on the barren outskirts of the city where it merges with the Sahara Desert. Most of the remainder - over 1.5 million people - live in 15 unofficial 'squatter areas' in the eastern part of the city, according to the US Committee on Refugees (USCR). While residents of the official IDP settlements are considered to be comparatively well provided for, and have access to supplementary food supplies, water, and essential medicines, there is generally much less social provision in the squatter areas. Several reports have described a "bleak humanitarian situation" for the latter category of IDPs, including regular outbreaks of disease, chronic food insecurity, and limited access to safe drinking water. The Guiding Principles and Shari'ah Despite the massive numbers of long-term IDPs living in close proximity to the seat of power, there is not yet an official government policy dealing explicitly with the treatment of IDPs, humanitarian sources told IRIN. In addition, the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement have not been officially endorsed by the government's Humanitarian Aid Commission (HAC). Despite being based on the Geneva Conventions, the Guiding Principles are not binding, and it is up to individual governments to choose whether or not to apply them. Indeed, the Guiding Principles would not be ratified by the Sudanese administration until they had been endorsed by the UN Security Council, Hasabo Muhammad Abud al-Rahman, a HAC official, told IRIN recently. According to Hasabo, however, at least half of the Guiding Principles were already covered under Shari'ah (Islamic law). With this in mind, research is under way to find ways of integrating fully as much of the Guiding Principles as possible into Shari'ah, humanitarian sources told IRIN recently. Despite significant overlap of the Guiding Principles with some parts of the national law, integration of the concept of rights as laid out in the UN document into Sudanese law could be a stumbling block, according to legal experts. Despite the problems, initial efforts have been made to promote the main aspects of the Guiding Principles in both the north and the south of Sudan, including separate seminars with government officials and SPLM/A representatives. It is also hoped that officials of Sudanese indigenous NGOs will play a key role in educating IDPs on the Guiding Principles, and the protection they aim to offer. Southern cycles of displacement Between 1.5 million and 2 million people are believed to be internally displaced in the south, including about 300,000 in government-held towns, and an estimated 80 percent of southern Sudan's five million people have been displaced at least once during the latest phase of war, according to USCR. Many displaced families in the south have fled from place to place during the war, living outside camps in destitute conditions, often indistinguishable from the local poor. Forced displacement in oil region In recent months, attention in the south has been focused on the oil-rich region of western Upper Nile, where an escalation of fighting in 2002 has heightened fears that the already grave levels of displacement could worsen. Religious and human rights groups have accused government forces of provoking mass displacements of civilians in order to secure areas for oil exploration. Khartoum, however, has consistently denied targeting civilian populations in oil areas, saying it is attempting to make the areas safe for oil operations, and has accused the SPLM/A of escalating military operations and causing the deterioration of humanitarian conditions. Although reliable estimates of the numbers and condition of displaced people in western Upper Nile have been difficult to arrive at because of fighting, and government of Sudan humanitarian access denials to a number of locations on the area, anecdotal evidence from the field paints a worrying picture. In an April report on the health situation in western Upper Nile, the international aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) quoted the testimony of Nyageai, a southern Sudanese woman in her early thirties. She had been forced to leave her village in July 2000 as a result of fighting between rival rebel groups. Once the fighting had subsided, she returned, with fellow villagers, to find that their tukuls (huts) had been burned to the ground, and their cattle - their main source of wealth - stolen. They spent two days and nights walking through the bush to the government-controlled town of Bentiu, but had to move on again after six months. MSF quoted Nyageai as saying as she sat in a small shelter in a cattle camp north of Nimne, 20 km east of Bentiu: "We have no hope when we are sitting in this place. We have no hope where help will come from. We have no hope." Peace deal signed Despite the Nyageai's pessimism, there may be some hope for Sudan's IDPs. In July, the government and SPLM/A signed a framework deal, which outlined the broad principles of a future peace settlement, and raised the prospect of mass IDP returns. Further moves towards peace were made in October, when both sides agreed to a cessation of hostilities for the duration of talks, and the loosening of restrictions on humanitarian access, at least until the end of 2002. Agreement has yet to be reached, however, on the modalities of any programme of resettlement, and on arrangements for a permanent ceasefire - a key requirement if large numbers of IDPs are to be able to return to their homes safely. Local agreement shows the way A local ceasefire agreed in the Nuba Mountains region of south-central Sudan, a "transition area" straddling the traditional lines of conflict between north and south, could point the way forward. Intense conflict between government and rebel forces over the course of the war had forced some 170,000 people into the perceived sanctuary of government-controlled "peace villages", with thousands more displaced living in SPLM/A-held territory, predominantly in the rocky, mountainous parts of the region, where access to farmland is scarce and food security poor. However, a confidence-building initiative by US Special Envoy to Sudan John Danforth resulted in a ceasefire agreement coming into effect in the region in January this year. The agreement, extended for a second six-month period in July, is being overseen by a Joint Military Commission, part of whose mandate is to build confidence in the ceasefire with a view to allowing the free movement of the Nuba people throughout the region. Perhaps the Nuba peace deal will point the way to a lasting peace in Sudan, thereby ending the cycles of displacement, and a return for many of the millions of displaced civilians forced to live in chronic insecurity with little or no prospect of a return home.