Returnees camped under tree in northern Upper Nile State. | Photo: Michael Daniel.

Authorities in Raja County of Western Bahr el Ghazal State said more than 3,000 returnees who fled the conflict in Sudan are in dire need of food assistance.

The press secretary of the Raja County Gismallah Hassan Dahia, said the displaced civilians, mainly women and children, have been arriving in the area since the beginning of Sudan conflict in April this year.

Mr. Hassan says the civilians trekked for several weeks while encountering assaults and robberies by Sudanese bandits before arriving in the country.

They returned from the Zamzum refugee camp in El Dein town of Eastern Darfur.

Hassan called on the UN agencies and NGOs to assist the returnees with food assistance.

“Their situation is worse, there’s no food and things are expensive, and they don’t have money to buy things, the county government trying to help them but there are a lot of returnees,” he told Eye Radio from Raja town on Friday.

“Even those in Boura Al Madina did not get shelters, those in Raja County are 3,190 and yesterday 8 people arrived here through Wau to Raja.”

“My message to the UN agencies and NGO’s is that let them help those people because they are in need of a lot of things, and if there’s rains it could help them in terms of cultivation.”

Since the fighting erupted in Khartoum, the UN has registered more than 200,000 people as having arrived in South Sudan, with 90% of them South Sudanese.