South Sudan: Humanitarian Access Snapshot (September 2023)

KEY HUMANITARIAN ACCESS HIGHLIGHTS

• Violence and threats against humanitarian staff and assets accounted for the highest number of incidents for the third consecutive month.

• Active hostilities in Pochalla, Greater Pibor Administrative Area (GPAA) resulted in the relocation of 20 humanitarian staff to Juba.

• Community members authored the highest number of incidents, mostly of violence and threats against humanitarian staff and assets.

• Interferences in human resources and staffing procedures suspended health services and health staff recruitment for over a week.

• An off-duty humanitarian staff member was killed in Mayom County, Unity State.

ACCESS OVERVIEW

In September 2023, 31 incidents related to humanitarian access constraints were reported across South Sudan, compared to 28 incidents in August 2023. Violence and threats against humanitarian personnel and assets remained the highest with 12 recorded incidents, followed by operational interference in the implementation of humanitarian activities and active hostilities military operations impeding humanitarian operations with six and five incidents respectively. As a result, one off-duty humanitarian staff was killed in Mayom County, Unity State; 25 humanitarian staff in Pochalla, GPAA and Rubkona, Unity State were relocated; and humanitarian activities were suspended across the country.

Upper Nile State accounted for over a third of all reported incidents, while Western Bahr el Ghazal and Unity states have recorded six and five incidents respectively. Six out of eleven incidents in Upper Nile were of restriction of movement, and four incidents were recorded of violence/threat against humanitarian personnel and assets.

Twelve incidents were recorded under violence/threats against humanitarian personnel and assets, accounting for the highest number of incidents for the third consecutive month.

Physical assault, threat, intimidation, harassment, looting/theft of relief supplies and robbery/ theft incidents remained the main concerns in Western Bahr el Ghazal, Upper Nile and Unity states. On 16 September, a group of unknown armed men reportedly broke into a nutrition store in Rubkona, Unity State and allegedly looted 0.25 MT of nutrition supplies.

Eight out of 30 incidents, mostly violence/threats, were authored by community members – indicating their aggressive reactions to decreasing humanitarian services despite heightened needs in the country. Moreover, the perpetrators for six violence/threat incidents, mainly looting/theft of response items, were reported as unknown.

Interferences in human resources and staffing continued to affect humanitarian partners in Unity and Upper Nile states. Demands by county authorities to be part of the panel for staff recruitment and hiring staff from the county or the state undermine the national guideline for NGO staff recruitment and NGOs' internal human resources policies. In Unity State, local authorities demanded replacing technical health staff from other states with the locals, which resulted in the suspension of health services that deprived over 100,000 people for 10 days