Mr. Conor Elliott:

I thank the members for a range of pertinent questions. They give us an opportunity to discuss some particular issues. As there is some overlap in the topics raised, forgive me if I answer some of them thematically rather than by responding to each member. I will start with Deputy Durkan's comment, and a link to the theme of hopelessness has come through in many of the members' questions. The situation is most definitely not hopeless, intractable, predetermined or definite. What is of great hope to all of us is the man-made aspect, particularly of this crisis in South Sudan and, by definition, it being man-made it is within the power of particularly the political elites in South Sudan to find a solution. Our staff, employees, colleagues and other Irish agencies live and work in extremely difficulty and challenging environments but it is never hopeless. Our whole mission is devoted to improving the lives of people and we impact on hundreds of thousands of people every day, particularly in South Sudan and now in Ethiopia in regard to this crisis.

I will briefly run through some of the points raised. The population there is in the region of 11 million. Somebody will correct me on that but it is approximately that size and we can provide the committee with the correct figure. I do not have figures from the pledging conference in Norway but we can get those and provide them afterwards. We can give a better breakdown on the pledges that were made last year and what were, and were not, met and what is the position regarding the current round of pledges.

A question was raised about Irish Aid or at least about the influence this committee can bring to bear on allocations or discussions around funding in Ireland. We have a very positive and responsive relationship with the humanitarian section and the civil society section in Irish Aid, and they are very responsive. We have very close relationships with them, however, we will always request that pressure be applied to the allocation of more fundings to non-governmental organisations. In terms of timing, now is a very good time for that.

The issue of timing links to another Deputy's question. South Sudan has just come out of the wet season. The wet season is a very big event in South Sudan. It is a moveable feast. It can start as early as April or May and as it moves across the country it can run as late as December and even into January. When it rains in South Sudan everything stops. South Sudan has very few roads. I wish I could give the members the figure for the number of tarmac roads there. I worked in Sudan as the country director for GOAL on a long-term placement seven or eight years ago and at that time there were 4 km of tarmac roads in South Sudan. That has dramatically improved today but it gives members an idea of some of the logistical challenges. We have to fly into most of the operational sites in which we work. In the wet season they can only be accessed by helicopter. We access some of our areas by boat and by canoe. There are no standard logistical supply lines into huge tracts of South Sudan.

There has been a poor harvest due to the conflict last year as a result of which there was a failure to plant. South Sudan has just come out of the west season. People have just harvested. Today the indicators are not as bad as they will be in two months' time. Today people are eating the stocks they have just harvested but those stocks will deplete very rapidly. We know they are nowhere yet near the levels they need to be to bring people through until the next harvest. We know that between now and the start of the next wet season there will be pockets of famine in and around certain locations in South Sudan.

Deputy Eric Byrne began the discussion around politics which subsequent speakers all raised, which is central to this whole issue. Ultimately, we are a humanitarian agency that is responding and reacting to the situation on the ground but the underlying causes of this are political and the solution will be political. It will have to be.

I will provide some background in terms of the question of ethnicity, the tribal groups versus ethnic groups and so on. Like all such conflicts, I cannot simplify this as it is very complex. All of Sudan and South Sudan have a very complex and long history of conflict and fighting. Many generations have lived through conflict, conflict with Sudan in the north and also conflict internally within South Sudan. There is a long history of fault-lines between communities, between geographical areas and between ethnic groups or tribes in South Sudan. There is a dominant ethnic group, in terms of numbers, in South Sudan known as the Dinka and it is by far and away the largest ethnic grouping. I could not tell the members the size of that grouping but probably 60% or 70% of the population are Dinka. The next largest group is known as the Nuer and it constitutes approximately 11% of the population and the rest of the population is a range of groups comprising Equatorians and so on. The current split between Salva Kiir, who is Dinka, and Riek Machar, who is Nuer, falls down along that ethnic line, but it is far more complicated than just the Nuer versus the Dinka. Much of this is tied into resources over which there is conflict in South Sudan.

Deputy Durkan raised the issue of natural disasters versus man-made disasters. Often there is a particular link between those in that natural disasters mean competition for resources and the competition for resources tends to lead to conflict and man-made situation around conflict. That is an issue in South Sudan and it has always been an issue. There are always cattle raids and conflict over access to lands and so on, but there is also the issue of oil and access to funding around oil, which Deputy Mitchell raised.

That is a very significant issue and a very thorny issue for conflict. Also, as throughout the history of Sudan and other conflicts, there is an issue of the debate, argument or power being centralised in a very small elite group and that there is an urban-centred approach and an enormous disconnect between it and people in regional and rural areas. Frankly, at the heart of all of this is the disconnect between the ordinary people of South Sudan in the rural areas and a small, extremely powerful military elite political group.

A question was asked about whether we support the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, IGAD, endeavour. This is at the heart of the political issue. There have been many initiatives in the past 14 months. One of the problems in fact has been that the process of trying to transition to a political solution has become fragmented and fractured and there are parallel and different conversations. There is Arusha, Addis Ababa and Juba and all sorts of different avenues of conversation. Also, within the different groups, be it the pro-government or the opposition, there has been a fracturing of the support base within those different groupings. It is a very complex group of different factions that are now involved in a range of different talks. The international community needs to back the one horse in this conversation. My position on this is that IGAD approach is the most likely one to back. It is the most advanced and probably the most credible conversation at this point. There needs to be a very frank conversation where all of these peace talks are brought in under that one stream. That stream needs to be amended, however. It needs to be changed to reflect the diversity of actors that are involved in this conversation. It has been quite limited in terms of who is involved in the process. It has involved the elites and it has not involved the voices of the other stakeholders, which is a very significant shortfall in the process.