The UN has expressed concern about what is already the world’s fastest growing refugee crisis, as thousands of South Sudanese civilians are fleeing to neighboring Ethiopia.
The mass exodus is taking place as Government troops advance on a rebel stronghold in the Upper Nile region.
Reports from the UN International Organization on Migration (IOM) “suggest that Government forces are now approaching the town of Maiwut, 25 Km north-west of Pagak. I’m gravely concerned by this ongoing situation,” the Special Representative of the Secretary-General in South Sudan, David Shearer, told reporters from Juba, the capital, a UN press release said.
He added that while it is unclear which side began the fighting, the military advance by the South Sudan forces “is not in the spirit of the unilateral ceasefire” declared by the Government in May.
Shearer said there has been “active military engagement” over the past week north of Pagak, and at least 25 aid workers have relocated in the area as a result of the insecurity.
The senior UN official, who is also the head of the UN Mission in the country, or UNMISS, also voiced great concern about an orphanage near Torit, south of Juba, surrounded by Government and rebel fighters who are preparing to fight.
“It’s unacceptable that 250 innocent children, and the people who care for them, find themselves in no-man’s land between the warring parties,” the press release quoted Shearer as saying.
Requests by UNMISS to access the Hope for South Sudan Orphanage have been denied “locally, on the ground.”
The UN official urged both sides to reflect on President Salva Kiir’s Independence Day message of peace and withdraw from the facility.