From: barnhart@netcom.com (Aaron Barnhart)
Subject: IPS:SUDAN: CHILDREN LEFT TRAUMATISED BY
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 05:33:04 GMT
Organization: Netcom
Reply-To: barnhart@netcom.com

Copyright Inter Press Service 1992, all rights reserved.  Permission to re-
print within 7 days of original date only with permission from 'newsdesk'.

Area: Africa, east
Reference: Third World Dvpmnt; Africa, east; Population
Title: SUDAN: CHILDREN LEFT TRAUMATISED BY ENDLESS WAR


an inter press service feature

lokichoggio, kenya, aug 14 (ips) -- the plight of child
refugees from sudan presents probably the most perplexing
aspect of mass displacement ever witnessed in independent
african.

the sudanese refugee stream to lokichoggio camp in northern
kenya has brought in over 15,000 children, increasing the burden
of care on the host nation which has been hit by a severe
drought this year, besides taking on the refugee influx from
war-torn somalia and ethiopia.

air transport is the only reliable way of delivering relief
supplies to this remote, windswept camp of unclothed and hungry
children who have innocently borne the brunt of the bitter
conflict in the racially and religiously divided sudan.

the nine-year war has claimed lives of their parents and
relatives: ''they killed them all'', said john abuk, who appears
to be in his early teens. ''they killed my mother, father and
children''.

''when i grow up, i would like to fly a bomber and kill the
people who have made me live without a relative'', added moses
kinda who was rescued by a woman from a village near the
southern capital of juba, destroyed in one of the northern
government's regular dry-season scorched-earth campaigns.

''they have witnessed scenes of savagery -- their parents
slaughtered in cold blood. violence is the only thing they have
learnt reluctantly from the enemy'', a former senior civil
servant in sudan told ips.

amoria makech, previously deputy director of information in
khartoum's ministry of information and broadcasting, who fled
persecution of the predominantly non-islamic southern sudanese
by the hardline islamic government in the north, says the
children have been forced to lead abnormal life.

''these children are missing every opportunity for education.
when they mature, they are likely to carry on the war in
retaliation'', observed makech.

resistance to the political and economic marginalisation
of southern sudan led to the guerrilla war waged by the sudan
people's liberation army (spla) under the command of colonel
john garang. (more/ips)


sudan: children (2)

the war has flushed hundreds of thousands of refugees to all
neighbouring countries. but the downfall of the marxist-leninist
regime in ethiopia in may 1990 forced 400,000 southerners,
mostly women and children to trek back into the south.

ethiopia people's revolutionary democratic front (eprdf), the
transitional government in power in addis ababa since may 1991,
was supported by khartoum in its ousting of former dictator
mengistu haile mariam who had backed the spla.

the eprdf forced the spla to dismantle its bases, and refugee
camps, regarded as fertile recruiting ground.

returning to drought ravaged sudan was not an end to the
refugees despair. a government dry-season offensive this year,
in which the army crossed into ethiopia and on at least two
reported occasions bombed refugee columns, has meant
another exodus for the women and children southward to kenya.

emotional shock from scenes of bloodshed and brutality is
bound to leave lifelong scars in the children's memories. they
rarely converse among themselves and most of the time they look
traumatised.

''they appear reticent and will never tell you when they feel
sick. they prefer to suffer silently'', says martine bory, a
french medical volunteer working for 'action international
against hunger and starvation'.

''most of them have no idea of their parents' whereabouts.
some of them say they hope to come across their parents one
day'', adds bory whose organisation tries to substitute the
missing family and kinship support for the young refugees.

reunification of displaced families from southern sudan, even
after the gunfire in the battlefield dies down, would be a
formidable task.

inside southern sudan, 73-year-old manonjong lom, a supporter
of the spla cause and now displaced, told ips that he has lost
30 of his children to the war, famine and disease.

once a prosperous merchant, lom married 31 wives and raised
67 children. home is now an spla camp at atapi, south of juba.

he arrived at the camp a couple of weeks ago, accompanied by
seven of his wives and about 12 children, including two babies
who were born on the way.

''i have no idea where the rest of my family is'', he said.
like thousands of displaced persons in southern sudan and those
who took refuge in adjacent countries, lom is hopeful one day he
will chance upon surviving relatives.
(end/ips/phk/ha/ar/oa/92)


-- 
Aaron (Barnhart@netcom.com) -- posting from Evanston, Illinois