Photos: Inside South Sudan’s worsening refugee crisis, in Renk and Maban
Al Jazeera
Aid organisations say more shelters, medicine and basic supplies are desperately needed.
For the last 10 months, thousands of people have fled the civil war in Sudan to Renk, a town just over the border in South Sudan.
Since April 2023, at least 541,888 people have arrived. In December, UN agencies registered 71, 757 people, the highest number of new arrivals from any month last year.
About 18 percent of them are Sudanese and 81 percent are South Sudanese. The latter likely left South Sudan when the country experienced its own civil war between 2013 and 2020. They were forced to return due to the war in Sudan between the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese army.
Conditions in Renk are bleak. Due to the high number of arrivals each day, refugee camps and gatherings are severely overcrowded. The transit centre was only preparing to host 4,000 people, but it now harbours more than 23,000.
Sanitation provision is woefully insufficient, with 200 people sharing one latrine. Cases of cholera, the measles and severe malnutrition are on the rise.
