Presidents Kiir and Bashir in a past event -File Photo

The United Nations, South Sudan, and Sudan have agreed to extend the joint agreement on transit of relief aid through Sudan to the needy in South Sudan.

The three inked a Memorandum of Understanding on Monday in Khartoum, marking the extension of the aid delivery until July 2018.

The agreement is meant to complete the delivery of 90,000 metric tons of aid to South Sudan, especially the former Upper Nile and Unity State states, where hundreds of thousands of displaced people are in UN camps.

“It’s now an annual extension and instead of only one corridor we are talking about four corridors,” said Marta Ruedas, representative of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Sudan.

In July 2014, Juba and Khartoum signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to open a humanitarian corridor to deliver food assistance to vulnerable South Sudanese through the Nile River or by road.

In January 2016, the agreement was extended for a six-month period.

The Sudanese Aid Commissioner, Mr. Ahmed Mohammed Adam, said Khartoum was committed to the food delivery to the neighboring state, adding that they would open more corridors this year.

“There is going to be an extension for one year, not six months as we used to do before,” said Mr Adam.

The South Sudan Ambassador to Khartoum, Mr. Mayen Dut, welcomed the extension, saying it would help save many lives.

“There are a lot of positive aspects that we achieved, one of them is, the increasing of the aid corridors from one to four,” he stated.

The agreement was first signed in 2014 after a civil war broke out in South Sudan.

The UN considers the route as the shortest and most cost-effective in the region to deliver the assistance to the conflict-affected South Sudan.