Ida is a refugee camp in South Sudan.
In a vast wasteland about 28 kilometers south of the disputed border between Sudan and South Sudan, there is a huge camp for refugees fleeing the aggression in Northern Sudan. From the air, this camp called Ida seems almost perfect - an African expanse of thatched hut settlements, dense green vegetation and dry patches of rust-colored land. Two years ago it was a tiny village of 400 people. The bright blue walls of the old village - the only permanent structure in the makeshift refugee camp - can still be seen if you look closely. Today, more than 70,000 Sudanese live in the camp, and every day up to 330 new refugees cross the border of the newly independent South Sudan.
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1. For most refugees, the journey to Ida takes 3 to 12 days. Along the way, they are often left without food and water, and they say that they survived by eating the bark or leaves of trees and quenching their thirst with dirty water from swamps or rivers. Many have complicated cases of diarrhea, malaria and malnutrition.
2. Refugees come mainly from the Nuba Mountains, where clashes between the Sudanese army and the northern Sudan People's Liberation Movement forced thousands of residents of South Kordofan to cross the border and reach the Ida camp.
3. Similar attacks on the people of the Blue Nile region have forced more than 113,000 people to leave their homes and move to refugee camps along the Upper Nile. Conditions in the camp leave much to be desired.
4. Domestic violence and sexual exploitation of women and girls reign here.
5. There are about 7,000 school-age children in the camp, but, of course, they do not receive education.
6. Many do not have enough bed linen - most of the refugees sleep on the bed branches of trees, covered with tarpaulins, or simply on the ground.
7. Food is just enough to not die, but not enough to eat properly.
8. Although many charitable organizations work for the benefit of such camps, the infant mortality rate here, unfortunately, remains too high.