The continuing battle for control of Sudan between rival militaries has had a destabilizing effect on the contested area of Abyei claimed by both Sudan and South Sudan, for both the UN mission there, UNIFSA, and the civilians they are mandated to protect.
That's according to Major General Benjamin Sawyerr, acting head and Force Commander for UNIFSA, who said the months-long clashes have seen close to 6,000 flee into Abyei and forced the mission to switch all its supply routes to South Sudan, increasing costs and logistical challenges.
UN News's Abdelmonem Makki began by asking him to outline UNIFSA's crucial role protecting civilians:
Major General Sawyerr: It's unfortunate that we have crises in Sudan to the Sudan used to be the major logistic or center for units. While we get our fuel, our contingent on equipment comes into Sudan. Most of the things we use in the mission comes to Sudan and even troops are rotated through Sudan. Unfortunately, the crisis has put a stop this you know, the he has peace of Sudan is a closed movement within Sudan is very difficult. So we now have to use South Sudan, which is longer and more costly to the directly. We have started seeing a lot of internally displaced persons moving into the Abyei box, refugees, returnees and newcomers as they call them. And so far we've had over 5000 getting close to 6000 now coming into the box. The constitutive very major humanitarian challenge, as you know, in the northern part of Abyei and U.N. staff members that we operate in, they are operating on any time Sunday. They had to leave because there was evacuation. But to mitigate this challenge, we have been in touch with the SARS humanitarian unit times, and she has been very helpful. And they've made arrangements to post in people from Port Sudan to command them, look into the humanitarian challenges. Efforts are underway also to ensure that humanitarian relief items get into the northern part of her, apart from that for the security of the returnees, newcomers, IDPs and refugees. We have the Pakistani battalion who are in the northern part of northern sector of Abyei Box, who normally provide security escort to them into the box.
UN News: But are there any security issues arising from the arrival of these new returnees from South Sudan to Sudan? or how is the situation Sudan, from Sudan to from Sudan to South Sudan?
Major General Sawyerr: Yet there are concerns about people taxing them. People are asking them, which has been brought to the notice of UNISFA. We are tackling it. We we speak with the humanitarian agencies so that they can open up a collection center, collision center at the not part of Abyei. We also encourage the traditional rulers of would they knock down cars on the Misseriya to speak with themselves and give assurances that this issues of harassment, taxation will stop? We have also engaged with the government of Sudan to inform them of this and challenges that the log Dinka returnees are facing. And so far, I think they're the voice of reason in these prevailing.
UN News: I will go back to the engagement between the mission and the youth and women in Abyei. You've talked about how the mission was able to forge peace between the local communities. And if you can tell us about the engagement between the mission and the women and youth, this part.
Major General Sawyerr: Yes. The mission realizes the importance of the women, youth in peace and security. And as you know, U.N. Security Council Resolution 1325 actually emphasized on the participation of women in the peace process. So what UNISFA has done is to ensure that we bring the religious tradition and cultural barrier of involving women in peace initiatives. So we have the gender advisors, the mix engagement team of the of the talks. We also have the Ciolos and the Opal working together to make sure that the women are brought into the forefront of peace negotiation, peace mediation. And they are all the conferences we are doing. When we went to enter before the Joint Traditional Leaders Peace Conference, we had representation of the women. We have also facilitated the women and youths attending the World Conference. We also ensured that they were they during the Dutch Peace Conference and as well as the Corridor conference. So we have also encourage women to form societies, organizations, so that we interface with them all the time to ensure that they are part and parcel of this peace process. And one should act in the mission has done is to ensure that the troop contributing countries come with female peacekeepers because they are better in interfacing women and this has been paying off.
UN News: Great. Finally, if you can shed some light on the successes and the challenges. You've talked greatly about how the mission was able to mediate between the communities, local communities. If you can tell us some of the successes and challenges that the mission is facing now.
Major General Sawyerr: I will. Well, I would want to give them a trumpet. I think the reconfiguration of units flying to a multinational peacekeeping force has achieved a lot. Now we are able to use the expertise from this experience of the multinational in each of the diseases to first and foremost ensure that there is peace and tranquility within the box. The rate of attacks, communal attacks has reduced tremendously. We now have better engagement with the various structures because we have to engage with the two host countries. We have to engage with the at the local level, at the local administrative levels of the of administration. We have to also engage at the traditional level, which is the communal level UNISFA has ensured that cattle rustling risk has gone down. And UNISFA has also ensure that humanitarian supplies and assistance to the community is flowing. We also have what we call the joint programing activities, which is meant to encourage commonality among the people staying there. The joint programing is succeeding. Also, I would say that efforts are being made to ensure that we engage the youths actively in the peace process, which is in the box.
