The Ethnic Cleansing of Fellata Ambororo from Southern Sudan
Dear Friends
Attached an information about a forgotten human rights issue,the ethnic cleansing of Fellata Ambororo in Equatoria, Southern Sudan by the government of Southern Sudan. The Fellata Ambororo is a Sudanese tribe which has the right to live in any part of our beloved Sudan, but apparently the government of Southern Sudan which dominated by SPLM, in accomplicity with the central government of Sudan which dominated by NIF/ Popular Congress have a different say regarding the rights of the Fellata Ambororo to live in Equatoria, southern Sudan. We should bring the suffering of the Fellata Ambororo to the attention of the world, and say no to the policy of ethnic cleansing of non- Southern Sudanese indigenous tribes in Southern Sudan................................................... .................................................. ..............................
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Sudanese tribe seeks new safe pastures
14 Dec 2006 12:03:39 GMT
Source: Reuters
JUBA, Sudan, Dec 14 (Reuters) - The government of southern Sudan has trucked 200 women, children and elderly members of a nomadic tribe to the outskirts of the southern capital Juba as part of a plan to move them 1,000 km (600 miles) north.
Sudan has asked the United Nations to help fly the group to their new home, possibly in Blue Nile province, but the men of the tribe, along with thousands of cattle, will have to make the epic trek on foot along the Nile, officials said on Thursday.
The nomads are from the Ambororo, a small fragment of a large cattle-herding tribe spread across West and Central Africa. They migrated to north and west Sudan several generations ago but never assimilated. Few speak Arabic or any of the local languages of non-Arab southern Sudan.
They have been living most recently in the Rokon area about 85 km (50 miles) west of Juba but have recently been in serious conflict with the original inhabitants.
The vice president in the south Sudan government, Riek Machar, arranged the evacuation from Rokon because tensions between the Ambororo and the host community had reached explosive levels in the past fortnight, officials said.
The women and children arrived safely at the Jebel Kujur Way Station near Juba, but some of the men were attacked on their way to the town, where they planned to sell cows and buy food for the journey north. Some of their cattle were scattered.
The course of the community's wanderings over the last few years is unclear. An international team which did interviews in September learnt that they came from Tulus in North Darfur, more than 1,000 km (600 miles) from Rokon, and started their movement to the south in 2002.
GOOD PASTURE
They stayed in Rokon between April and October 2005 and moved back there in April this year after clashes with other communities in Western Equatoria State, officials said.
Their travels are not so unusual in the vast African country, where several cattle-herding groups wander large distances in search of good pastures and tolerant neighbours.
Conflict between nomads and settled farmers is one of the root causes of the violence in the Darfur region, where tens of thousands of people have been killed since early 2003.
The United Nations is planning to make fresh assessments of the Ambororo situation over the next two weeks to ensure that efforts to find peace for the tribe do not end in exporting a problem into Blue Nile state in northern Sudan.
Deng Deng, the director of Riek Machar's office, said the government of southern Sudan was supporting the move. Official plans were being made to protect the Ambororo up to Bentiu, close to the border between the south and the north.
In the meantime, the nomad women and children are using a way station intended for use by Sudanese refugees who will return with U.N. help from Uganda, the Central African Republic and Democratic Republic of Congo.
The way station can hold only 500 people, and refugees and internally displaced persons are expected to stay for only a few days. The nomadic Ambororo do not fit into either category.
But a U.N. official said helping the Ambororo did not lie outside the U.N. humanitarian mandate. "There are absolutely exceptional pressures on this group which is not part of their normal lifestyle. We would not assist nomads in normal conditions, but here there are clear grounds for U.N. support," said the official, who asked not to be named.
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