Families reunited across enemy lines in the south

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has started reuniting families who had been separated in southern Sudan by a 21-year-old war between the government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A). Benoit Chavaz, ICRC head in the southern town of Juba, told IRIN on Tuesday that some 52 children and elderly persons were flown from Mabiat village, near Tombura, which is controlled by the SPLM/A, to the government-controlled towns of Wau and Raja on 26 October. The repatriation followed the earlier reunification of two elderly persons from government-controlled Juba to Yei, an SPLM/A-controlled area in West Bahr-el Jebel State. "This is the first time since the early 90s that ICRC has been able to reunite families across enemy lines," Chavaz said. Since 1992, he added, the ICRC had only managed to receive security clearance to reunite 132 people, of whom 78 were moved this year. "We try and make contact with the families at both ends to make sure there is mutual agreement and the transported persons will be able to find adequate support when they arrive," Chavaz continued. According to the ICRC, many children and elderly fleeing fighting between the government and the SPLM/A were separated from their families and ended up in camps for displaced persons, where they did not have adequate support. In Raja, for example, an attack by the SPLM/A three years ago had forced hundreds of civilians, including children, to flee to Mabiat. One of those repatriated, 73-year old Seraphino Losuk, told IRIN he used to be a trader in Yei before violence broke out near his village, forcing him to flee to Juba. Separated from his wife and nine children, he had been living in Podulu IDP camp without adequate assistance.