The ICRC remains extremely concerned about the precarious situation from a humanitarian viewpoint in various parts of Darfur. Continued fighting and generally poor security conditions in many areas are making people even more vulnerable than before and hampering aid workers' access to those in need. The ICRC itself has suffered two serious security incidents since the beginning of the year, a state of affairs which it deplores.

The first occurred east of Jebel Marra when a field team returned to the area after a prolonged absence. Following an assessment of local needs, a distribution got underway in early February of non-food items for over 13,000 displaced people. However, half way through the planned three-week operation, two of the team's drivers were briefly abducted and a Land Cruiser was stolen in broad daylight, bringing the distribution to an abrupt halt. The distribution was cancelled and the team returned to El Fasher.

The second incident occurred on 8 March on the road between Abata and Zalingei. Six ICRC staff members were returning to their base in the late afternoon after assessing and working to improve village water supplies, when their Land Cruiser and truck were hijacked. The whole team was abducted. They were released unharmed the following morning and found refuge in a village only after walking through the desert for five hours.

The precarious security situation makes it extremely hard to plan and carry out field activities, and means that communities most at risk in rural areas are often reachable only sporadically, if at all.
Gereida

The ICRC is now covering the basic food, water and sanitation needs in Gereida camp and has made contingency plans until the end of the year. However, close contact is being maintained with the NGOs that withdrew from the town following the attack on 18 December (see previous Bulletin) so that activities can be transferred back to them when they return.

The first priority after the ICRC took over these activities was to carry out a food distribution, which had not been done since the NGOs left. This operation began on 11 February and lasted two weeks, benefiting over 122,000 people. The second distribution was carried out in March and involved ICRC staff, volunteers from the Sudanese Red Crescent and over 100 workers hired on a daily basis. Beneficiaries received soap in addition to their regular rations of sorghum, lentils, sugar, salt and ground-nut oil. Plans have been made for the future distribution of non-food items such as tarpaulins, blankets, clothing kits and jerry cans. These are now being purchased for 25,000 households.

The ICRC's Gereida team has been substantially reinforced to cope with the extra workload in the camp. Measures will be taken to avoid disrupting the outreach programmes supporting agriculture, promoting economic security and maintaining water supply in villages in the Gereida area. For example, in February an assessment was conducted in one of the few villages to which displaced people have, sporadically, been returning to harvest cash crops, prepare for the new planting season, and engage in other income-generating activities.

In the weeks ahead, the ICRC plans to provide returnee households with staple seeds to help them maintain their livelihoods back in their villages. It also plans to distribute donkey ploughs and other tools.

Other outreach activities undertaken in South Darfur since the beginning of the year have taken ICRC staff as far south as Radom, over a day's journey south of Gereida. Here they distributed blankets, kitchen sets, jerrycans, soap and other household items to over 3,000 people who had been displaced during local clashes.
Support for the disabled in Southern Sudan

The welfare of people left disabled after the long civil war in Southern Sudan is still a matter of great concern to the ICRC. Following the closure last July of the organization's field hospital in Lokichokio, in northern Kenya, the limb-fitting and other medical services that the hospital had provided to some 4,000 war-wounded over the years were transferred to Juba.

Since the move back to Southern Sudan, more than 400 amputees have been brought for treatment to the government-run limb-fitting and rehabilitation centre (the Juba Orthopedic Workshop), which receives support from the ICRC. In one month alone this year, 54 patients from Wau and other areas of Western Bahr el-Ghazal were admitted. More than half of these were former patients from the field hospital in Lokichokio who had come for follow-up treatment. Patients receive dormitory accommodation and meals throughout their stay in Juba. All services are provided free of charge.

Under the terms of a memorandum of understanding signed with the government of Southern Sudan in June 2006, the ICRC is constructing a new physical rehabilitation centre in Juba town to which patients can be referred. It will be capable of producing as many as 100 prostheses and orthoses plus 1,000 crutches a month, thus greatly strengthening the services already available to the disabled.

The ICRC is also sponsoring 17 students to train as limb-fitting technicians, 10 of them in Tanzania. Two physiotherapists are being trained in Rwanda. A further fourteen technicians are being trained under ICRC auspices in Khartoum. Two of these will work in Juba after qualifying.

The ICRC is also supporting another limb-fitting and rehabilitation centre in Nyala, as well as the physical rehabilitation centre in Khartoum run by the National Authority for Prosthetics and Orthotics.

All in all in 2006, 2,454 patients were assisted in the various centres (including Lokichokio until April). A total of 1,342 prostheses and 1,059 orthoses were fitted, and 2,029 pairs of crutches were made.
Transfer of ex-detainees

On 21 February, following a request from the Sudan People's Liberation Army and the Sudanese Armed Forces, the ICRC facilitated the transfer to Khartoum of four men who had been detained during the civil war in Southern Sudan. This was in line with the terms of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, in which the ICRC's mandate as a neutral intermediary is recognized.

Prior to their transfer, the ICRC met with the ex-detainees in Nimule, close to the Ugandan border, to verify that each one was returning home of his own free will.

The men travelled in an ICRC aircraft, and were received upon their arrival in Khartoum by Sudanese military officials.
Distributing essential supplies to displaced people in Bahr el-Ghazal

The ICRC has provided 500 blankets, 1,000 pieces of soap and 500 items of children's clothing to 1,000 displaced persons in Raga and Boro Medina, Bahr el-Ghazal. The families were displaced last September during tribal clashes in villages around Buram, South Darfur. The distribution was carried out on 3 and 4 March by the Sudanese Red Crescent, facilitated by The German Red Cross who has been rehabilitating primary health care clinics in the area.