♪ >> this is al jazeera. these are the headlines. haiti's government has asked the united states and the united nations to send troops and to help stabilize the country -- in to help stabilize the country after the assassination of the president, by a heavily armed hit squad. we have reports from mexico city. reporter: the fact that there are so many international actors almost ensures this is going to be a continuously developing story. the less that -- the last that we have heard was from a press

conference earlier today and a tweet from the colombian president, saying again committing colombia, sending investigators and special forces to help with the national investigation, but also we are hearing some of the more strategic points. a little more information about the actual people involved. >> meanwhile, the un security council has approved aid deliveries from turkey into rebel held northern syria for another year. russia had threatened to block that operation, preferring rather that aid be directed through damascus. but a last-minute compromise was reached. the taliban claims it now controls 85% of afghanistan. it has made major gains this week in the vacuum left by the withdrawal of u.s. foreign forces. there were talks with the taliban delegation in moscow. a factory fire killed at least 52 people in bangladesh.

many workers were trapped behind locked doors, it's believed. dozens of suffered injuries trying to escape from the upper floors. factory fires are common in bangladesh, where many businesses operate illegally and without safety measures. they u.s. president has called on his russian counterpart, vladimir putin time -- vladimir putin, to crack on several criminals. -- crackdown on cyber criminals. covid-19 cases across the u.s. are increasing rapidly, sparking fears of a new outbreak. the 11% rise in a week is being blamed on the delta variance, now the dominant strain across the u.s.. the latest data shows more people are being sent to hospitals in areas where there are lower rates of vaccination. those are the headlines. i will be back with more news here after "inside story." do stay with us. ♪

mohammed: south sudan became independent 10 years ago, but jubilation quickly gave way to war, famine, and political infighting. so what's the future for the world's youngest nation? can there be peace? this is "inside story." ♪ hello, and welcome to the program. i'm mohammed jamjoom. south sudan's first president, salva kiir, promised a new beginning of tolerance love and -- new beginning of tolerance,

love, and unity. 10 years ago. the world's newest nation had gained independence after decades of war with the rest of sudan, but the excitement was soon replaced by a civil war of its own, fragile peace deals, and humanitarian crises. salva kiir still leads the nation a decade on, but he's been locked in a power struggle with the first vice president, riek machar. many say their rivalry has hindered south sudan's development, particularly relating to the country's vast oil reserves. speaking at a ceremony to mark independence, he urged people to embrace peace. >> on my part, i assure you that i will not return you back to war again. let us all work together to recover the last decade and put our country back to the path of development in this new decade. mohammed: 400,000 people died in the civil war. after independence.

millions are still displaced, and half the population urgently need aid, despite foreign donations worth hundreds of millions of dollars. haru mutasa reports from the capital, juba. reporter: john cox says his people voting overwhelmingly to secede from sudan 10 years ago wasn't a mistake. it's what happened to south sudan afterwards that broke him. the war in 2013, then another round of fighting in 2016 has left him traumatized. >> it was not only 2013. we had our colleagues, my brother. [indiscernible] even during this struggle. -- killed during this struggle. my brothers, they were also killed.

so when it repeats itself, it was horrible. reporter: things are now relatively calm. unlike previous peace deals that failed, some people hope the unity government set up last year will hold. it saw former rebel leader riek machar sworn in as first vice president, along with four other vice presidents. president salva kiir and machar are once again trying to work together until the elections in 2023. politicians hope this transitional period encourages refugees and internally displaced people to return to their homes. thousands of people live here, and this is just one of many camps across south sudan. there's no running water and not enough food. many families say they don't know how long they're going to be here, and going home for several of them is not an option, because of insecurity in some parts of the country. add to that floods, droughts, and intercommunal violence. children born after independence have never known peace. aid workers say the humanitarian crisis is worsening. >> these are some of our greatest concerns. certainly, there's a food and

-- food insecurity crisis in south sudan. 1.4 million children are going to be malnourished this year, the highest number in years. reporter: key parts of the peace agreement are still to be implemented. these include establishing a unified national army, made up of opposition and government forces. >> the people of south sudan are telling their leadership that, look, we are tired of war, and nobody wants war anymore. if there are some few political leaders who think that they will go and mobilize some of our citizens, so that they cause a fight, because they want to be leaders of this country, i don't think they will get the audience from the public. reporter: the new coalition government is trying to rebuild focusing on various developmental and infrastructure projects, as new buildings go up in some parts of the country, uniting a bitterly divided nation, building trust, and making sure it's safe enough for everyone affected by conflict to return home is going to be much more difficult. haru mutasa, al jazeera, juba.

♪ mohammed: all right, let's bring in our guests. in juba, geoffrey duke, security analyst and director of the south sudan action network on small arms, a network against armed violence. in nairobi, nyagoah tut pur, south sudan researcher for human rights watch. and also in juba, james okuk, conflict management specialist and senior research fellow at the center for strategic and policy studies. a warm welcome to you all. nyagoah, let me start with you today. there was so much excitement in south sudan, when it became an independent state. how did things so quickly go from that initial mood of euphoria to there being a civil war breaking out? you know, just a couple of years later. >> we have to understand that south sudan got handed a good deal and also a bad deal. at independence, you had a new government that was made up of various armed groups, militia

leaders, and previously, political leaders who were also at war with themselves. and at that point, the person that was steering the ship had also passed away, dr. john duran. so from the beginning, you had a very shaky political foundation for the country. you also have to understand that the 2010 election that preceded independence had also led to insurgencies, where certain individuals who had not won in the electoral processes took up weapons against the new government. also the 2005 peace deal that paved the way for referendum, as well as independence, also did not address certain key issues, including the question around reconciliation. how do you reconcile not only ethnic groups, but also the political leaders who were going to unite into a government? it also did not address the issue around accountability. how do you address the legacy of the war of successive sudanese

governments? as well as the violence and abuses that had been committed by various southern and groups against civilians. so given this, and that you had an international community that was eager to put together a government in a state without addressing certain key issues, you know, these very issues around accountability, the building of institutions, concrete institutions that can be able to hold, even if the center falls apart. so these are some of the issues that led to -- you know, that made it easy for south sudan to collapse in december of 2013. mohammed: geoffrey, from your point of view, were expectations, especially on the part of the international community, were they just too high at the get-go? and were there signs that were obvious early on, that these deep-seated issues just weren't being properly addressed? >> i would like to talk more

about the expectation of south sudanese, instead of that of the international community. i do not think the expectations of south sudanese have been unrealistic, in that the country has a lot of potential, in terms of the resources, both mineral and oil, and, human resources, to build a viable state. there is a very, very huge gap. and i can tell that the south sudanese are disappointed, they are frustrated, and that their hopes are held hostage. mohammed: james, what are some of the biggest challenges that south sudan faces today? >> we have three major challenges. one of one of these is the leadership challenge, and this has been missing from the very time of the declaration of the independence.

up to now. the political leaders in the country have been much into power and struggle, and then they believe in military power more than civilian legitimacy. and this has put the country into a train of violence, and this violence has affected the development progress in the country until now. so that's the first challenge. the second challenge is the institution. those leaders failed to give a strong institution that could have managed the public affairs in the country. and because of this weak institution, those leaders have always run the machinery of the government, on a personal basis, and on connection with whoever they would like to deal with, rather than building the country

or building the nation. the third problem that we have is the human capacity itself. south sudan is blessed with a qualified human resource, but then, how to utilize them and how to put them into the right position in the public offices, it has been a big problem. and usually, nepotism, tribalism and even business connection has been the trend of appointing a technocrat into the government. and this has caused a big problem of having the wrong people in the right offices of the government. so these three challenges actually have been facing south sudan, and they have contributed to the level of the violence that we have now, because the civil service is not respected by those liberators. they respect military ranks, more than the undertaker.

mohammed: nyagoah, i want to talk for a moment about the scale of human suffering in south sudan, caused by the humanitarian crises there. of course, you have the world food program, that has said that south sudan faces its worst hunger crisis -- its most extreme levels of food insecurity since independence. that around 60% of the population are enduring severe shortages. then you have unicef. they have warned that a record 4.5 million children in south sudan, that's two out of three children in the country, are in desperate need of humanitarian support. what needs to happen in order to start getting much needed aid to people who are suffering so much? >> yeah, first of all all, those figures that you've pointed to are quite depressing, because like both james and geoffrey have said, this country started with so much promise, only to fall by the wayside.

and so, what has followed, the hunger crisis and likely famine that the country is facing now, is mostly a result of this man-made crisis. it is the result of years of conflict, years of forcing civilians to flee their homes because of violence or the threat of violence. and it is also the result of, over the last two years, an escalation of what we have seen, of localized violence, into communal violence that is egged on by political and military actors in jungling lakes, parts of the northern state, and also in wara. and so, populations in this part of the country have faced acute malnutrition and acute hunger. there's also the climate crisis. you know, there has been flooding over the last couple of years, and all this has contributed to the disenfranchised south, east. but, you know, the government has, over the last couple of

years, been unable to invest in infrastructure. you know when you go across the country, even with a bird's eye view, you'll see that there's very limited public road networks, and the education sector is plagued by lack of capacity and inadequate access to education for several children around the country. much of the service provision, much of, you know, food security, and other critical issues, like health care, is left in the hands of humanitarian agencies. and so, south sudan needs to break away from this cycle of aid and humanitarian dependency, and that can be done by, you know, funneling all the oil wealth and resources that the country has into ensuring these basic services are made available to ordinary citizens. but also, even while that is being worked on, the government has to ensure an end to obstruction of humanitarian aid and an end to attacks against

aid workers, and taking action on individuals that attack aid operations. so far, over 120 south sudanese -- over 128 workers have been killed, since the conflict started in 2013, and most of these people are south sudanese. south sudanese who are sacrificing their lives to go to the front lines, to actually be able to support and help their fellow citizens. so a lot needs to happen. but first, it's about silencing the guns. the government ensuring that the war comes to an end, and that both the opposition national salvation front and the government and the attacks against civilians in the southern part of the country, but also in other places, the government needs to take concrete action on political and military actors, who are

actually fueling the local violence in these areas. mohammed: mohammed: geoffrey, nyagoah there was talking at one point about the need to try to funnel oil wealth, you know, to the people, to make sure that these humanitarian crises are dealt with. of course, we know that south sudan relies on crude sales for revenue, that it's currently experiencing a rapid decline in oil output. for a country that is so rich in oil, why are the people of south sudan still not really seeing the benefit of that? >> well, i think that is mainly because of a mismatch between the resources and the needs of the citizens. the government can see and can hear the priorities of citizens, that they're obviously all out there, but they have chosen not to, you know, allocate the needed resources to the needs of citizens. for example, like nyagoah said,

the health sector is largely enough for the ngo's to, you know, to fund, and that is similar to the education sector. and you see enormous budget allocations to the security sector, yet you cannot see that huge allocation making it into the security and safety of citizens. that clearly tells us that the value for money doesn't make sense, in this fashion of expenditure, but also related to that, the exploration of resources has largely been done in the shadows. there's no clear transparency to track how much south sudan is actually earning from the sale of its resources, and where this money is going, and the news about corruption is not new. there's a culture of immunity.

resources, you know, coming in from oil and minerals, are going into the dark, disappearing into the pockets of individuals. yet there is nothing being done. you know, to stop such flow of the national resources into individual pockets. we have the entire anti-corruption commission, which illustrates the existence of institutional devices to root out corruption. but that is not functioning. so one can say that the anti-corruption commission largely was created to exist, rather than to function. so unless the government changes its attitude towards letting a government officials loot public -- towards letting government officials loot public resources and get away with it, we will see these enormous resources continue to go to spoil, while the people of south sudan continue to suffer. mohammed: james, there are observers and analysts who say that foreign donors need to

revise their approach to aid, and that they need to start holding south sudanese leaders accountable. how likely is that to happen? >> yeah, it can happen, but it needs a courage from the donors themselves. these donors have been supporting the government that does not care for selfish delivery for a long time. right from the independence of south sudan in 2011. there has not been accountability in the public institution that has been tasked with the management of finances and resources of the country, and the donors have not taken keen attention on that. they kept pouring money to south

sudan, and also, they kept sending their own managers to come and take care of those donors' funds, and not much attention has been paid to the government institution, including the budget itself or how do they design the budget or their plans. on the basis of how the budget lines are designed, and even after the budget has been approved by the parliament, is it followed or it is not followed? particularly the infrastructure sector. allocated to human resource development sector. all these questions have not been asked. and then, the donors were busy bringing money, but not paying

keen attention to whether this money adds value to enhancing the capacity of south sudan to take care of itself and to control its own destiny, like the rest of the nation that have taken their independent long time ago. so there has been that lack of attention from the donors and whatever they bring to south sudan, they think that it is still a young country, and there's not much to say about it. let's compromise with those leaders, until, you know, they learn how to do things better, but 10 years down the line, those leaders have never learned anything. there are no lessons. they keep repeating, you know, the same attitude of mismanagement of public resources, because they know somebody will come and take care of the population, while they do not take care of the population. their responsibility is being taken by the donors, while they run away with the public resources. and this is unacceptable.

as far as the responsibility of the government is concerned, the first thing for a government is to make sure that services are delivered to the citizens. that's not happening. it is the donors, and then the humanitarian industries that are doing that. not part of the world. take for example the ministry of health. what we call the food fund. including the all the medicine brought to south sudan. the government does not have any hand in it. it is all donors who are paying. the donors are taking care of our health system. they are taking care of our ends -- and the government has raised for those donors, the same for education. they have abundant teachers, they are not paying them good salaries, they are not paying them in time, and they expect them to run schools like that. and the donors have been also

taking care of our schools, and the government has just abandoned the responsibility for generation of services. -- for generations of services. mohammed: james, i'm sorry to interrupt you, but we're starting to run out of time. nyagoah, can i ask you to talk a little bit about the kind of toll that the trauma caused by the civil war has taken on civilians in south sudan? the civil war was extremely brutal. it took a horrific toll. it was marked by, you know, rapes, killings, child soldier recruitment. what kind of toll has it taken on everybody? and also, where do things stand, when it comes to the establishment of accountability mechanisms, like perhaps a war crimes court? >> right, i mean, i think, you know, when we talk about the civil war in past tense, it may have been ended by the 2018 peace deal, but its repercussions and its consequences are still felt, even today. and so, all sides to the war,

you know, the government and allied militias, all the opposition groups, all of them cannot claim innocence on what has happened to south sudanese. all sides killed civilians, committed rapes, abducted civilians, and also recruited children and used children in their armed forces. so reckoning from, the scale of the abuses that have been committed, is something that is important, so that we don't have to have another conversation about war breaking out, because its root causes were not addressed. and so, now, the government, you know, has to ensure accountability for all these gross violations and abuses. the peace deal that they have signed calls on them to establish a war crimes court, and in partnership with the african union, known as the hybrid court. now, in january, the government agreed to establish the war crimes court and a commission on truth reconciliation, women, as

well as a reparations authority. and now, they're yet to follow through, along with the african union, to make this court a reality. chapter five of the peace deal is one of those chapters that reflects the wheel of the south sudanese people. when you look at the entirety of the piece, you know, this segment of the peace deal is quite important, but even beyond that, the government needs to ensure reliable and credible institutions for justice. the justice sector is one of the sectors that has been under-invested in and under-prioritized in south sudan. and so, along with creating this, ensuring this war crimes court becomes a reality, there have to be reforms in the judiciary to ensure its independence, to ensure enough budget to allow it to build its own capacity. mohammed: all right, we have run out of time, so we're going to have to leave the conversation there. thank you so much to all of our guests, geoffrey duke, nyagoah tut pur, and james okuk. and thank you, too, for watching. you can see this and all of our

previous programs again anytime by visiting our website, aljazeera.com, and for further discussion, go to our facebook page. that's facebook.com/ajinsidestory. you can also join the conversation on twitter. our handle is @ajinsidestory. from me, mohammed jamjoom, and the whole team here, bye for now. ♪ aaaaaaañrç rcrcrcrcrcrcrcrcrcrc■

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