http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2016/08/war-world-forgot-160824134809716.html
SOUTH SUDAN
The War the World Forgot
People and Power investigates the forgotten war taking place on the
borders between North and South Sudan.
25 Aug 2016 09:54 GMT South Sudan, Sudan, Omar Bashir
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It's one of Africa's most bitter, if often forgotten, conflicts.
In 2011, South Sudan gained independence from Sudan following a 2005
peace deal that ended Africa's longest-running civil war.
After a referendum, in which an overwhelming majority of South
Sudanese voted to secede, Africa's newest country came into being, the
first since Eritrea split from Ethiopia in 1993.
But two Sudanese provinces, South Kordofan and Blue Nile, the people
of which predominantly wanted to become citizens of the new nation,
were excluded from the deal.
The SPLM-N, the northern affiliate of Sudan's People's Liberation
Movement (SPLM) in South Sudan, consequently took up arms against the
Sudanese government of President Omar al-Bashir, and fighting has
continued on and off ever since.
Five years ago, as the war got under way, People and Power sent
reporter Callum Macrae to investigate allegations of war crimes
committed by the Bashir regime in the region. Last month he went back.
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FILMMAKER'S VIEW
By Callum Macrae
To the northeast of rebel-held territory in the Nuba mountains of
South Kordofan, in Sudan, there stands a small symmetrical hill,
called Al Azarak. It is surrounded in the rainy season by lush green
land which used to provide a good living for the small farmers who
lived here. But no longer.
Al Azarak was the scene of bitter fighting between the SAF and the
SPLA [Al Jazeera]
Last April it was seized by the forces of Sudanese President Omar
al-Bashir during a multi-pronged offensive designed to overwhelm the
forces of the Sudan People's Liberation Army North (SPLA-N) in this
central area of the Nuba mountains.
The offensive failed, and Bashir's forces were driven back on most
fronts. Their only significant gain was this small hill, which is
today the focal point of a tense military standoff. It now seems
inevitable that when the fighting season resumes with the end of the
rains in a couple of months, the trigger for renewed conflict will be
the fight for this rather beautiful little hill.
This forgotten war began five years ago, just a couple of weeks before
the partition of Sudan and the creation of the world's newest state of
South Sudan. The Sudan People's Liberation Movement in South Kordofan
and the Blue Nile had fought with the south in Sudan's long and bitter
civil war, but were left in the north after partition.
READ MORE: A journey deep into Sudan's foresaken Blue Nile
The people of these two areas had been promised a public consultation
on their future. But instead, Sudan launched a pre-emptive war against
them. The SPLA-N fought back. Today they, and their political
movement, the SPLM-N, insist that they have no desire to be part of
the newly independent South Sudan, run by their bitterly feuding
former comrades.
Instead, they say they want the overthrow of Bashir, and the creation
of a new, democratic Sudan, in which the decades of discrimination
against the Nuban people is ended.
I visited the rebel-held areas in 2011 just as this new war began. In
those days, although Khartoum had banned anyone from entering the
territory, it was still possible to fly in and land on an improvised
runway cut from the bush. Today Bashir's bombs have made that
impossible. Instead you must travel illegally, overland, from South
Sudan - and in the rainy season that can only be done on quad bikes, a
journey that can take the best part of two days.
A war against civilians
This is a cruel war, being fought on two fronts by the Sudanese
government. The first is their conventional war with the SPLM North's
army, the SPLA-N. That is a war no one is likely to win. The Sudanese
Armed Forces (SAF) are far larger and far better equipped than the
SPLA. They are also backed by a large number of mercenaries and
militias. But the SPLA know the area, are much fleeter of foot and, as
they will often insist, they are volunteers fighting for their
homeland. After five years of bitter fighting neither side has made
significant gains.
But the government's second front is far less conventional. It is a
war against civilians. A war fought using bombs dropped randomly on
civilian targets, effectively rolled out of the back of old Russian
Antonov transport planes.
While we were there we passed schools, hospitals and farmsteads
destroyed by government bombing. In Kauda, the rebels' administrative
capital, the government hospital has been abandoned after three huge
parachute bombs failed to explode. Today they still sit there,
embedded in the ground, a permanent, lethal threat. And there is no
one who can disarm them because all NGOs, including de-mining
companies, are banned by Khartoum.
Further north, on the way to the frontline at Al Azarak, we met Fatana
Kodi and Abduraman Alom. Two months ago their four young children were
playing with two friends in their small farmstead when two government
jets flew overhead and shelled their home. All six children died
instantly. There was no conceivable military target in the area. As we
arrived we could hear the drone of an Antonov plane above - a constant
threat.
Mothers displaced by the SAF assault on the village of Al Azarak [Al Jazeera]
But there is another tactic that Khartoum is accused of employing, and
perhaps the most sinister of all. Locals say the government is
deliberately preventing humanitarian access to the area, using the
denial of food and aid as a weapon of war.
They also accuse the government of targeting agricultural land - as at
the hill of Al Azarak - in an attempt to starve out the population.
Locals warn of a growing incidence of malnutrition and epidemics
caused by the lack of medical facilities and vaccination programmes.
The Sudanese government rejects these claims completely. A spokesman
accused the SPLM-N of "terrorising" the population. He described them
as "a branch of the SPLM that misrules South Sudan," and claimed that
"arms and salaries are transferred through the porous border".
Last month, Khartoum announced a unilateral ceasefire, describing it
as a chance for the SPLA-N "to join the peace process and surrender
their arms". It played well internationally but was dismissed as
meaningless by people in South Kordofan and the Blue Nile who say
fighting is largely suspended during these months anyway because the
rainy season renders the government's heavy artillery immobile.
Last week the African Union-mediated peace talks stalled after
Khartoum rejected the SPLM's calls on Khartoum to lift its blockade on
humanitarian aid and allow access via Ethiopia. The government said
the route could be used to supply weapons to the rebels. The SPLM-N,
which believes Khartoum would use exclusive controls over humanitarian
access strategically as a weapon of war, suggested a compromise
whereby 80 percent came via the government and only 20 percent via
Ethiopia, but that was rejected.
And so the people of both South Kordofan and the Blue Nile are
preparing once again for the fighting to restart. It would mark the
start of year six of this forgotten war.
Source: Al Jazeera
Received on Fri Aug 26 2016 - 04:23:19 EDT