The violence along Sudan’s contested north-south border shows that militias can still strike with impunity despite a heavy military presence on both sides of the border. Observers fear such attacks could derail key talks between the north and south preceding the south’s declaration of independence, set for July.
In the past three weeks, UN agencies have reported at least eight attacks on convoys of buses driving through central Sudan. The most serious incidents occurred near the contested border hot spot of Abyei, a fertile area claimed by both northern and southern governments.
The UN report also said a convoy was shot at on Jan. 17 as it passed through the oil fields of Diffra, just north of Abyei.
On Jan. 8, Aguer joined the tens of thousands of southern Sudanese returning home, encouraged by the prospect of her homeland becoming Africa’s newest country. She was still north of the border, in a convoy of some 800 people on Jan. 9, when the convoy came under attack, despite a guard of Sudanese soldiers. Gunmen shot in the air to stop the buses then looted luggage and valuables.
“We were just frozen,’’ said 38-year-old Aguer. Aguer was searched and said her clothes were torn by a woman who was with the raiders.
The mother of a 3-month-old baby was stabbed to death when she refused to give up her cellphone, according to an internal UN report and interviews with witnesses. A separate report, based on interviews with more than 80 families, said roughly half of them were robbed. Others reported missing family members after the attack.
“Even though they took everything, I am happy to be home with my children alive,’’ Aguer said, sitting in a makeshift lean-to of thatched straw and wooden poles in the southern town of Aweil. Around her, new arrivals slept in the open; some had scrounged a plastic sheet or a bit of straw for a roof.
