South Sudan: Top UN Mission Official Says Situation in the Country is Bleak
By Staff Writer
The outgoing head of the United Nations mission to South Sudan, Hilde Johnson on Tuesday July 1, in New York described the situation in the country as bleak, calling for sustained international pressure to ensure that the rival parties adhere to signed peace agreements.
As part of a cessation of hostilities agreement signed on June 10, 2014, the parties agreed to the formation of a transitional unity government in two months or Aug 10.
However, Johnson, who ends her 3 year tenure in the country on July 8, has warned that the fabric of society in South Sudan has been torn apart and that accountability will be key to any lasting peace in the region.
With the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD)-mediated talks again stalled, the UN's top official to the country warned that the window of opportunity for peace was a narrow.
"Within the next few weeks, what is critical is international pressure for the parties to abide with these two critical provisions that they have agreed upon and for the parties to put the country and its people first over and above any individual interests," she said.
She noted that for reconciliation to take root, accountability and justice for atrocities would be a prerequisite while any healing process would have to be trusted and inclusive to address historical ethnic-based tensions in the country.
"What we now have to question following the crisis is the importance of not only agreeing but also to look at how true reconciliation can happen which addresses what has happened in past history. I think one of the reasons why the crisis became so grave and it fuelled ethnic violence, was that although people have been accommodated and have come in to South Sudan to been part of the government, the real reconciliation actually never happened and so what happens is you fuel future tensions," she added.
Thousands have died in the six-month civil war, and 1.5 million people have been internally displaced with hundreds of thousands fleeing to neighboring countries.
"This was a situation that was caused by the collective leadership; they failed to get things straight and fuelled the fire and I think that is the main problem and you have a collective responsibility for what happened; you can't point in one or the other direction," said Johnson.
"But even leaders who were key and knew what was going on, a number of them have told me that they never expected the scale, speed and the scope."
Her appointment to head the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) coincided with the country's move to independence in July 2011, with a mandate to support the government in peace consolidation and institution building after decades of war.
Much of that was on track until the quick unraveling of the political situation in the world's youngest state. It will be left to her yet unnamed successor to help piece back together a nation wrought by war, mistrust and human suffering.
On June 30 Johnson, warned of famine in the “coming months” unless the country’s “worrying” humanitarian situation was adequately addressed.
She said humanitarian situation in the new nation was making it difficult to deliver aid to some areas inaccessible by road, yet not enough was prepositioned in preparation for rainy seasons.
"This is one of the biggest humanitarian crisis in the world and we are worried that famine can come within any time and hit levels that we have not seen before in the history of South Sudan", she said.
Johnson urged the warring parties to put the country and its citizens above all to pave way for peace.