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Norway: South Sudan crisis is man-made, government must act

Tuesday, 21 March 2017 12:16 PM [ Last Update: Tuesday, 21 March 2017 12:19 PM ]

A child collects water from a water point in Juba, South Sudan, on March 21, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

Norway's foreign minister says South Sudan's leaders have inflicted a massive humanitarian crisis on the population threatened by a famine, adding that a stop in fighting in the civil war is needed urgently.

Borge Brende says South Sudan is "one of the world's biggest humanitarian disasters," affecting nearly 6 million people.

He said the crisis is man-made and a solution must include agreement with opposition groups.

Brende called Tuesday for a worldwide ban to stop "the flow of weapons" into the world's newest nation.

A mother and her child sleep in a bed of the pediatric ward of a hospital in the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) Protection of Civilian site (PoC), outside the capital, Juba, South Sudan, January 24, 2017. (Photo by Reuters)

According to UNICEF, more than 5 million people in South Sudan don't have access to safe, clean water, compounding the country's problems of famine and civil war.

Since 2013, South Sudan has been embroiled in a civil war that has killed at least 50,000 people.

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