UN Return Of IDPs To Southern Sudan

24 November 2010 – (Khartoum) – The United Nations Mission in Sudan, UNMIS, says it is supporting the voluntary and organized return of Internally Displaced Persons from northern Sudan back to southern Sudan within the context of its contingency plan.

The UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, Mister George Charpentier addressed a press conference in Khartoum on Wednesday.

[George Charpentier]: “In our contingency plan we are geared up to higher levels of returns but our message has been very clear: we have to avoid creating a situation of dependency; we have to avoid creating IDP and transit camps. Once we set up a big IDP camp of 20 – 30,000 people, we more than often get stuck with it for a number of years after that and you create unnecessary dependency among the population. Of course a contingency plan from the humanitarian perspective is always based on a worst case scenario, because if you want to have maximum preparedness to the possible outcome of a process, you plan for a maximum worst case scenario. But this does not mean that we believe the worst case scenario is the most likely scenario. So that has to be very clear”.

Mister Charpentier is urging the donors to pay the money they pledged so that UN agencies can be ready to respond to any humanitarian emergency.

[George Charpentier]: “A call for donor support has been made recently in respect for 63 million US dollars to the donors which is an advance on the 2011 humanitarian action plan. Some donors have already responded in terms of pledges, but further action is necessary to turn these pledges into concrete funding into cash and to reach the amount requested to fully cover the humanitarian contingency plan as early as possible. If they can give it already in November or December as an advance to the tune of 63 million, this will enable agencies and partners to preposition more capacity of food and non food items in order to response to unplanned needs.”

Mister Charpentier also urged that the voluntary and organized return programs for IDPs returning to southern Sudan and Abyei areas should be de-linked from any political agenda.

Charpentier said the return of IDPs to the south ahead of the referendum has been accelerated by what he calls “the feeling of uncertainty” by many southerners in the north and northerners in the south.