SUDAN: Durable solutions elusive as southern IDPs return and ...

while existing services fell short of addressing the social and medical needs of IDPs living in
Khartoum (UNHCR, November 2007, p.8).
Impact of the expulsions of NGOs in March 2009
Following the issuing of an arrest warrant for President Bashir by the International Criminal Court
on 4 March 2009, 13 international NGOs were expelled from northern Sudan, while the licences
of three Sudanese relief organisations were revoked (HPG, 26 March 2009).
A number of these NGOs had been working with people in the peri-urban areas of Khartoum,
including displaced people. Some examples of the impact of the expulsions:
According to Save the Children UK, the decision by Sudanese authorities to suspend its
operations would affect 50,000 children in Khartoum and in Red Sea state, where Save the
Children UK had been working with community groups on children’s rights (including access to
education and access to clean water), gender-based violence and HIV/AIDS. Save the Children
stated that around Khartoum, it worked with displaced families, some of whom had fled the
violence in Darfur and were living in desert-like conditions. Save the Children UK was helping to
protect them against physical and sexual abuse, as well as giving young people training in skills
such as carpentry and tailoring. It also was helping to reunite children and parents who were
separated while fleeing their homes (IRIN, 5 March 2009 and 31 March 2009; Save the Children
(UK), 4 March 2009 and 18 March 2009).
Oxfam stated that its expulsion would affect 200,000 people in Khartoum state and the east of
Sudan, where Oxfam had been running programmes providing clean water, sanitation, education
and microfinance (Oxfam, 4 March 2009 and 15 April 2009).
The International Rescue Committee stated that its expulsion affected 1.1 million people who it
had been assisting in north and east Sudan in the fields of medical care, water, sanitation, and
education programs and other vital services (IRC, 4 March 2009).
Property, Livelihoods, Education and other Economic, Social
and Cultural Rights
Livelihoods and education
Education
School enrolment rates for IDP children are very low, especially for girls (2009 Work Plan for
Sudan, November 2008, p.203). OCHA reports that in 2006 48 per cent of children in the
Khartoum IDP camps are not attending school (OCHA, May 2006, p.7). According to IOM’s 2006
survey, 35.9 per cent of the IDPs surveyed have no formal education (IOM, September 2006,
p.viii), while according to a 2003 report 44 per cent of IDPs had no education at all (Care/IOM,
2003, p.14). According to Tufts-IDMC, IDPs in Khartoum are significantly less educated than non-
IDPs, they are more likely to be illiterate, and fewer IDPs have completed secondary and
university education than non-IDPs (Tufts-IDMC, August 2008, p.8).
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