United Nations/New Delhi, May 29 (IANS) An Indian Army colonel was injured in crossfire between two warring groups in South Sudan on Thursday, according to sources monitoring the UN peacekeeping mission.
The sources said in New York that the officer was injured in the back of the neck, but not seriously, when a camp in Malakal was hit. Indian peacekeepers are deployed there to protect several thousand refugees.
In New Delhi, a defence ministry source said the “officer was hit by a stray bullet. He is stable and does not suffer any major injury. He was part of the UN force there.” the source however declined to reveal the name of the officer.
“His condition is stable,” said an external affairs ministry official, adding that the officer was still in South Sudan.
The UN secretary general’s spokesperson, Stephane Dujarric, confirmed that a peacekeeper was injured but could not identify him or his nationality. “The UN Mission reports new firing outside of its compound in Malakal,” he said. “One peacekeeper was injured.”
The attack occurred hours before the Security Council voted to extend the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) till November end and authorised it “to use all necessary means” to protect civilians “irrespective of the source of such violence.”
On Friday, the UN observes the International Day of Peacekeepers.
India’s Permanent Representative Asoke Kumar Mukerji had warned the Security Council last week about the deteriorating situation there in two letters to its president, Raimonda Murmokaite that IANS has seen.
On May 20, he wrote, “It is extremely important that the Security Council take urgent action to prevent any casualties and collateral damage with regard to the Indian troops and internally displaced people (IDPs)” or refugees.
Of the 2,000 Indian troops in UNMISS, more than 800 are based in Malakal, situated in South Sudan’s oil-rich Upper Nile state, sandwiched between Sudan and Ethiopia. The region has been wracked by fighting between forces loyal to President Salva Kiir Mayardit and supporters of former vice president Riek Machar Teny of Sudan People’s Liberation Movement in Opposition (SPLM-IO).
The fighting escalated about a week ago when Major Gen. Johnson Olony defected from the government side to Machar’s, taking with him a large troop contigent. Kiir retaliated by moving reinforcements to the area.
Soon afterwards Mukerji wrote to Murmokaite, “The threat is both extremely grave and imminent” and asked for assurance that “every measure feasible will be taken to ensure that casualties and damage are avoided”.
His fears are underscored by the killing of seven Indian army personnel in two separate incidents in 2013 in South Sudan.
Diplomatic sources familiar with the situation in South Sudan said that a political solution to the conflict was essential to bring peace to the area and the peacekeeping operation could not by itself achieve that. One of them paraphrased UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon’s quip, “You can’t keep peace if there is no peace” to emphasise the point.
Ban in a report to the Security Council last month conceded that there was a “lack of progress towards securing a peaceful settlement of the conflict”.
The sources faulted the Security Council, which does not adequately consult with troop-contributors, for not taking stronger measures to push the warring sides to a political settlement.
The peacemaking process has virtually been outsourced to a seven-nation East African organisation, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), which has so far failed to broker an enforceable peace.
Ban has also not given the South Sudan crisis the same level of attention as he has to others like Yemen.
Asked Thursday if Ban plans to reinvigorate the peace process there, Dujarric deferred to IGAD, saying: “It’s something that IGAD continues to be in the lead. We are supportive of that process.”
Recounting the conditions under which the Indian peacekeepers operate, a source who has seen the operations first hand, said that although the Security Council tells them “to use all necessary means”, they are virtual sitting ducks when they come under crossfire.
This is because they cannot retaliate as that would lead to direct attacks that could endanger the civilians they are protecting. “Best bet is to lie low and not do anything unless they are directly attacked,” the source said.
As a protection against mortar and heavy weapon fire, they need bunker-like defensive structure, which the UN and South Sudan government do not want built as that would appear to make the UN compounds sheltering the refugees permanent installations, the source said.
Due to lack of planning and logistics, most of the 5,000 personnel brought in during the troop surge authorised by the Security Council last year are still sitting in Juba, the country’s capital in the south instead of being deployed to areas needing them, the source said.
As result the peacekeepers in the conflict areas are stretched thin and pinned down guarding the refugees, rather than going out on confidence-building patrols. The patrols, undertaken on the ground or from the air, are an important element of the Security Council mandate because they also bring along staff from other UN agencies and NGOs for outreach activities.
Transporting troops, supplies and relief for refugees difficult because South Sudan has few roads. The Upper Nile state depends mostly on river transport and convoys require armed escorts, which are in short supply.
Bangladesh has contributed a riverine unit from its navy, but it is only now being deployed, the source said
More helicopters and aircraft suitable for operating there are needed.
Peacekeepers’ movements are also restricted by the South Sudan government, the source said. Often, when they are cleared by the government, they also have to coordinate with opposition forces to ensure they are not attacked, the source said. But they do come under sporadic attacks.
Mukerji pointed out to the Security Council president in a letter last Friday that a camp at Melut in Upper Nile state ran out of water and the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army was not allowing the peacekeepers to fetch water from the river.