Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: South Sudanese let bodies rot, disdain the starving as weak Date: Wed, 28 Oct 92 15:01:10 EST Message-ID: \SE A;WORLD \HD South Sudanese let bodies rot, disdain the starving as weak \BY Jonathan Stevenson \CR SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES \DT WAAT, Sudan WAAT, Sudan - Less than a mile from the south Sudan town of Waat, a freshly gnawed skeleton lay maggot-ridden in the bush. The carcass was only 2 days old, but vultures had quickly picked it clean. Back in town, Nyapuri Kolang, a 40-year-old woman, sat emaciated and forlorn in Waat's only feeding center. Ten days ago she began a 30-mile trek with her husband and six children from their farm in Pathay, which was ruined by flooding and then drought. Two of the children died on the way. Her husband and a third child lasted until they reached Waat. All four starved to death. Mrs. Nyapuri could not even imagine her future, much less muster hope for returning home. "I don't know. I might die, I might live. I don't know," she said, dissipated with hunger and grief. Waat is in the eastern part of south Sudan, which is controlled by the Nasir faction of the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA). The Christian and animist rebels have been at war with the Muslim fundamentalist government for a decade. The Nasir faction, led by Riek Machar, split from John Garang's mainstream Torit faction of the SPLA in August 1991. Until recently, the Nasir group managed to avoid major hostilities with government forces and at least to contain the burgeoning hunger problem in its territory by protecting aid agencies reasonably well. But war and famine have chased the civilian population relentlessly and now have caught them with a vengeance. Clusters of vultures over the marshy fields around Waat mark the open graves of people who collapsed and died before they could be fed. The south Sudanese consider them weak and shameful and will not dignify their deaths with proper burial. Roughly 15,000 people, half of them displaced, live in and around Waat. Due to flooding, drought and war, Waat has no domestic sources of food. It has drawn people from the government-occupied Bor and Kongor areas, 100 miles south, only because the World Food Program (WFP) brings food there and nowhere else nearby. The United Nations agency has funding to deliver 8 tons of food per day to Waat, but due to technical problems with its aircraft operated only two flights since Oct. 10. As of Oct. 24, about 7 tons of dry food was needed daily to feed the people of Waat. The town has one feeding center run by Sudanese community health workers. At last count, almost 1,000 malnourished children, half of them severe cases, had been brought there for supplementary feedings of Unimix, a specially fortified porridge. The inexpert Sudanese personnel, aided by a lone WFP field worker, can feed at most 300 people per day. With no dry rations coming into Waat, they also must contend with starving adults clamoring for the children's gruel. Monitors subdue them by beating them with sticks, and the problem is bound to worsen. As of last Saturday, the center's stockpile consisted of 50 100-pound bags of Unimix - enough for only two days. The WFP's plane was still down for repairs. The outlook gets even more grim. Waat is likely soon to attract more refugees and less food. Last week the Nasir faction attacked and besieged Malakal, a government-held city 50 miles northwest of Waat, reportedly capturing the government's largest southern armory outside of Juba. The hostilities are expected to force 30,000 to 40,000 people to move toward Waat. But in retaliation for the siege of Malakal the government may well deny the WFP authorization to fly food into Waat or anywhere else in Nasir territory, just as it did when the Torit faction quarantined Juba. Absent government permission, food cannot get to places like Waat that are in the interior of the country. Even now a single nongovernment organization is on the ground or providing food in south Sudan. The WFP is on its own, with one good airplane and one one broken airplane to service an area larger than Texas containing more than half a million people displaced by war with no source of food except external aid. The reason is fear. The rebels' intimidation and arrogance have turned aid workers like Tom Murfitt, an Isle of Man fisherman who 18 months ago came to south Sudan brimming with goodwill, into weary cynics. "The SPLA treats expatriate aid workers with nothing but contempt and derision," says he disgustedly. "I am completely disillusioned. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM