By Yien Gattuor Mead
Unity State Relief and Rehabilitation Commission (RRC), in partnership with the World Food Programme (WFP), have on Friday commenced registration of returnees from Sudan.
RRC Chairperson, William Ruot Riak Teny said the registration of the returnees at is being conducted ahead of food distribution by World Food Programme (WFP).
He said the exercise is targeting returnees who have arrived in Koch County via Nyaruop Port from war-torn neighbouring Sudan since July.
“The ongoing registration is targeting to register more than 5,000 returnees in Koch town and other areas within Koch County,” Teny told No. 1 Citizen Daily Newspaper in an interview.
Some returnees abandoned their settlements in search of food and medication for their children.
“The returnees will start receiving food by next week; as we speak, more new arrivals are coming through Nyaruop Port, and there are some people who came without being registered by officials at the border crossing points,” Teny stated.
He said they will be tracing some of the unregistered returnees who crossed into Unity State’s Koch County.
South Sudan now hosts more than 190,000 returnees, including refugees who fled fighting in Sudan across the 12 border crossing points, according to the United Nations.
The fighting, which erupted in the Sudanese capital of Khartoum on April 15 and soon spread to different parts of the country, is being fought between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
Both sides have accused each other of initiating the conflict.