A first group of 400 vulnerable Dinkas will tomorrow begin the
final leg of their long journey home from Juba in Sudan’s
Central Equatoria to Bor, in Jonglei province.

The group, consisting of elderly, disabled, expectant mothers
and women with young children, will board an IOM chartered
double-decker ferry for a 14-hour journey up the White Nile.

“The state-owned ferry needed some major renovation work
before it could be used for the return operation,” says
IOM’s Louis Hoffmann, who is coordinating the return
operation in Juba. “We first had to install water and
sanitation systems, refurbish resting areas and purchase 500
lifejackets. Despite our best efforts, the engine could not be
started. So the ferry will actually be pushed by a
tugboat.”

IOM staff will provide medical assistance during the journey.
Over the next two months, IOM plans to organise up to 12 rotations
between Juba and Bor to assist some 4,200 vulnerable internally
displaced persons (IDPs).

They are part of a much larger group of some 12,000 Dinkas who
fled Bor for Maridi, in Western Equatoria some 14 years ago to
escape fighting between Sudanese government forces and the Sudan
People's Liberation Army (SPLA).

Following the signing of the peace agreement on January 2005 and
the subsequent handover of Bor to the government of Southern Sudan,
the group decided to return on foot to Bor, via Juba, with up to
half a million cattle, their prized possession.

The Dinkas and their cattle have already crossed the White Nile
at Juba and are travelling northwards to Bor on the river’s
east bank. Several cattle camps are reportedly already on the
outskirts of Bor.

At the request of the government of South Sudan and in
coordination with the UN, IOM has already provided ground
transportation for vulnerable IDPs from various areas west of Juba
to an UNHCR-run way station in the city.

The World Food Programme (WFP) and UNICEF and the Adventist
Development and Relief Agency International (ADRA) are providing
food, medicine and medical care at the way station. The UN and
various NGOs will provide reintegration assistance upon arrival in
Bor.

Although hundreds of thousands of southern Sudanese displaced by
the conflict are estimated to have returned to their homes, this is
the second large group of IDPs who have received IOM’s return
assistance. Last summer IOM provided assistance to the most
vulnerable among a group of 5,000 people trekking through dense
forests and swamps to their homes in Raja in Western Bahr el
Ghazal.

There are an estimated six million internally displaced people
in Sudan, four million of them displaced by the 21-year conflict in
the south.

For further information, please contact:

Louis Hoffmann

IOM Juba

Tel: +882 16433 38260

Email: "mailto:lhoffman@iom.int" target="_blank" title=
"">lhoffman@iom.int