Thousands Flee Latest Round of Fighting in South Sudan

Doctors Without Borders suspend activities, staff flee

Since it was founded in 2011, the land-locked country of South Sudan has been in a near constant state of various wars. The latest round of violence erupted in the country’s east, with fighting nearing Pibor town in the east.

Thousands are fleeing from the town, and the surrounding area. Doctors Without Borders reported the town’s entire population has fled, that they have suspended activities there, and that their staff has also fled into the bush to escape the fighting.

This fighting is between ethnic rivals, and that the two sides have been fighting since 2011. These fights often leave very high body counts, and the Doctors Without Borders not having activities in and around Pibor, a lot of injuries could become fatalities with no one to tend to them.

Problems like these have been constant across South Sudan, where US-backed independence was supposed to mean a stable, oil-rich nation and instead has produced a nation of constant war and a government that’s mostly been at war with itself from its founding.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.