South Sudan deserves your attention

South Sudan, the world’s newest country, is in crisis, and not many people are paying attention. The landlocked African country broke apart from Sudan after decades of war in 2011. But within a couple years, innocent civilians were once again stuck in a country in full-fledged conflict, this time between political and ethnic factions internally and not between it and its northern neighbour. The conflict has now led to famine, the first declared anywhere in the world in close to six years. The country has oil and Western support to succeed, but its institutions are in their infancy and politicians are bitterly fighting for power. It’s a man-made disaster, and one political leaders are accused of creating. United Nations officials say soldiers are blocking roads into places where aid is needed, asking for money and sometimes forcing the aid convoys to turn back. The famine-stricken region is opposition-controlled. Refugees have been pouring into neighbouring Uganda and to a lesser extent Ethiopia and Kenya. Close to 1.6 million people have fled the country since the conflict heated up in December 2013. Yet this refugee crisis has received scant headlines. Aid organizations have been trying to drum up interest in any way they can. But crises like this one, man-made and confusing to explain, don't easily provoke a person to reach for their wallet and give to those in need. For politicians in Canada, too, there’s not much incentive to pay attention. The South Sudanese community in Canada is fairly small, so the pressure from voters is not hot. In the last month, since the UN declared that South Sudan was in the midst of a famine, the Conservatives, to their credit, have asked about the situation once in the House. And the Liberals later asked about it too, lobbing a softball question to the international development minister so she could tout a recent announcement of $120-million to provide food, drinking water, and health care. That’s commendable. But Canada can do more. Back around the turn of the millennium, then-foreign minister Lloyd Axworthy was involved in trying to broker peace between the then-warring Christian and animist south of Sudan and the Muslim north. Liberal Senator Mobina Jaffer was appointed a special envoy to the peace process in Sudan in 2002. Yes, it’s a complex problem and the peace process in South Sudan has run in fits and starts. But Canada could work with governments in the region to offer its help as a mediator, if need be. It could urge the warring factions to respect aid workers (several of whom have been killed amid the fighting). And it could do work with aid groups to devise ways to help the South Sudanese people to the fullest extent possible. It could also provide aid to those who’ve fled to neighbouring countries. It’s a complex problem, but one Canada should care about. The first couple paragraphs of a weekend Globe and Mail story said it all: there’s “mounting evidence that an oil-rich regime is using the brutal tactic of deliberate starvation to crush a revolt by its own citizens. “Yet...there is little sign of any urgent response by the world’s most powerful leaders. Instead there are growing fears that political apathy and U.S. budget cuts will make the catastrophe even worse.” There’s ample room for the Liberal government to prove its usefulness on the world stage here.

South Sudan deserves your attention

Time for a shift: Canada must treat Alzheimer’s like other progressive diseases

Between wars and fears of fascism in the U.S., there’s plenty to be scared about

Poilievre can’t just ‘cat-call from the periphery’: Tom McElroy

The problem of political homelessness

Liberals have fumbled green energy transition, and Conservatives have zero interest

Trump alienates women and Puerto Rican voters

With the world’s attention on Gaza and Ukraine, another conflict rages on forgotten

A tale of three famines

Canada muted as Sudan humanitarian crisis mounts

Sudanese Canadians looking for feds to step up, say MPs

Canadian government puts politics ahead of people in Sudan

News

Get free news updates

Opinion

Submit a guest opinion article

resources

Advertise

subscribe

get help

South Sudan deserves your attention

Get The Foreign Policy Newsletter