Attack by northern forces in disputed border region scatters more than double number estimated by UN, says local official
Up to 80,000 South Sudanese may have fled their homes after northern forces seized the contested border region of Abyei a week ago, according to a local official.
That is more than double the 30,000 people estimated by the United Nations to have been displaced. The raid by northern forces came just seven weeks before independence for South Sudan, and raised fears of a fresh north-south conflict.
Dominic Deng, commissioner of Twic county in Warrap state, about 80 miles from Abyei town, announced the new figure on Friday, and said the situation for those displaced was getting worse.
"They are sleeping under the trees. They need food and water ... some people are dying," he told journalists, Reuters reported.
President Omar al-Bashir sent tanks and ground troops into Abyei last Saturday, causing tens of thousands of people to flee, many of them into the bush. Shops and homes were looted, and many huts burned down. Thousands of armed Arab nomads allied to the Khartoum government were also reported to have moved into the area.
Bashir angrily rejected calls from the UN and the US to withdraw his forces, and blamed the southern army for forcing his hand by attacking a convoy of northern troops earlier this month.
But on Friday, Bashir's chief negotiator on Abyei, Al-Dirdiri Mohammed Ahmed was more conciliatory, saying that the northern government was open to negotiations, and that talks with southern representatives would start on Saturday. South Sudan's president, Salva Kiir, condemned the takeover of Abyei, but insisted that his people would not be drawn into another conflict.
Abyei remained a flashpoint area even after the end of the two-decade civil war between north and south six years ago, and has seen several major flare-ups. Both parties laid claim to the fertile region, but agreed as part of a 2005 deal to let local residents determine their future in a referendum that was scheduled for January this year. The result seemed likely to go the way of southern Sudan, since the bulk of Abyei's population is made up of Ngok Dinka, who are allied to the south. Bashir's government demanded that Arab Misseriya nomads who graze their cattle in Abyei for part of the year also be allowed to vote.
Khartoum's stance forced the Abyei poll to be abandoned, even as the larger vote on southern independence went ahead, with about 99% of people choosing to split from the north.
Both the northern and southern armies have reinforced their positions near Abyei in recent months. Analysts say that while neither side wants a return to conflict, Bashir could be trying to use the threat of war to try to force the south to make economic concessions before the formal split on 9 July. Most of Sudan's oil lies in the landlocked south, but Kiir's government will have to negotiate a revenue-sharing deal with the north, since that is where oil pipeline flows.