The UN view

In an interview with IRIN last week, the UN Special Envoy for Humanitarian Affairs Tom Eric Vraalsen insisted after talks with the government in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital: “I would use this opportunity to urge the parties to the conflict to redouble their efforts to seek a political solution to the conflict and in so doing the establishment of a comprehensive, negotiated ceasefire, which will make it possible for OLS to go all over the country in peaceful conditions.”

Vraalsen, who told IRIN in the interview that OLS was “very good shape” following the temporary stoppage earlier this month to relief flights from its base in Lokichokio in northwest Kenya, also said OLS had not had access to eastern Equatoria for a “long, long time”. He said he had also discussed the situation of tens of thousands of displaced people in West and Upper Nile with the government, and that it had agreed to the mission of a new humanitarian assessment team to the area. “We have an agreement (with the government of Sudan). It’s a signed document between the foreign minister and myself. There is a paragraph in that document which talks about this assessment mission, so that was agreed.” He said the mission would go to the area “as soon as possible”.

He also said he had told the Sudanese government that OLS would continue “to work on the basis of previous agreements and on the humanitarian guidelines that have also been adopted by the General Assembly and all the bodies of the UN and also on the principles of transparency, impartiality, neutrality and accountability. That message was conveyed to them.” He also said that the issue of a Sudanese representative being based in Lokichokio - an issue raised by the US Red Cross in its criticism - was a matter for the Kenyan and Sudanese governments, and not the UN.