Photo Courtesy Baptist Global Response
The ceasefire in South Sudan failed before it ever got started, and efforts to resuscitate it are not going well.
Fresh fighting erupted six days ago as peace talks re-opened in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 24 hours later, talks sputtered to a halt with rival leaders blaming each other for the violence.
Aside from the obvious, the impact of delayed peace is seen on the ground in the refugee camps. Oxfam estimates that 2.5 million people are at risk of severe hunger within the next three weeks. Humanitarian aid can’t keep up with the growing demand. Even if a ceasefire happened tomorrow, a food crisis would still emerge because farmers can’t get back to their fields.
Tens of thousands are displaced into about 30 refugee camps located in extremely inhospitable areas of Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda. The makeshift camps lack basic access to clean water, and food supplies are low.
So here’s a question for you: did you know this was happening? Jeff Palmer with Baptist Global Response says this man-made disaster is similar to Syria in theory, but without the attention. “There’s been fighting in the area for years (some of the things that lead up to it becoming a new country). Then, when it becomes something that becomes more of an internal conflict, or among people groups (tribes), and there are bigger things on the scene like Syria, or Ebola, or those kinds of things, eyes get turned away from a crisis like South Sudan...”
Call to action
Fresh fighting erupted six days ago as peace talks re-opened in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 24 hours later, talks sputtered to a halt with rival leaders blaming each other for the violence.
Aside from the obvious, the impact of delayed peace is seen on the ground in the refugee camps. Oxfam estimates that 2.5 million people are at risk of severe hunger within the next three weeks. Humanitarian aid can’t keep up with the growing demand. Even if a ceasefire happened tomorrow, a food crisis would still emerge because farmers can’t get back to their fields.
Tens of thousands are displaced into about 30 refugee camps located in extremely inhospitable areas of Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda. The makeshift camps lack basic access to clean water, and food supplies are low.
So here’s a question for you: did you know this was happening? Jeff Palmer with Baptist Global Response says this man-made disaster is similar to Syria in theory, but without the attention. “There’s been fighting in the area for years (some of the things that lead up to it becoming a new country). Then, when it becomes something that becomes more of an internal conflict, or among people groups (tribes), and there are bigger things on the scene like Syria, or Ebola, or those kinds of things, eyes get turned away from a crisis like South Sudan...”
Call to action
- Pray for workers who are going in to help get water established in the camps in South Sudan that are in critical need.
- Pray that Sudanese Christians in these camps will share their stories with others and help them find the hope of Christ.
- Ask God for the resources needed to meet the needs.
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