Operation Lifeline Sudan, 1989-1993, in Pictures: Detlef Palm

by Detlef Palm

(click on any image to enlarge)

During its first years (1989-1993), Operation Lifeline Sudan was  the largest humanitarian relief operation worldwide. It was an affiliation of several UN-agencies and about 40 non-governmental organizations providing humanitarian assistance to the war-afflicted people in southern Sudan, operating under a common framework and agreement. 

The long-lasting conflict between the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) and the government of Sudan had reached a new height. The SPLA forces controlled huge swaths of land in southern Sudan, while the government controlled the major garrison towns. Virtually all the civilian population, half of them children, were cut off from any assistance.

OLS came in two parts: the Northern Sector covering government controlled areas from Khartoum, and the Southern Sector covering areas controlled by the SPLA, operating from Kenya led by UNICEF. Much has been written about the origin, achievements and failures of OLS, but there is very little about how it actually worked. 

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In summer 1988, following more frequent reports of mass starvation and increased donor pressure, UNICEF Khartoum managed to negotiate access to the frontier town of Abyei. As of 2022, it is still undecided whether Abyei belongs to Sudan or South Sudan.

The first metric ton of Unimix, Abyei, 1988

The Twinotter spirals into the graying sky to avoid any rocket attack from the surrounding area. Now, it sets on a straight course back to Khartoum. I look for the highest tree in what could be dubbed the market place of Abyei, and unpack my tools to set up the radio.

I came with the first mission to the garrison town of Abiye, since the second Sudanese Civil War had started in the summer of 1983. The mission includes the American Ambassador, his entourage, Cole Dodge and myself. Our idea is to demonstrate international concern and that the UN is able to deliver relief into a war zone. The dignitaries spend two hours on the ground, watching the rows of emaciated children, listening to local officials explaining how they run out of food, and what the UN should do to feed the children.

Alpha Bravo calling Alpha Hotel Tango. I catch the UNICEF Twinotter mid-air, on its way north. Seconds later, the radio operator from Khartoum comes in, jubilant. We have created a foothold.

I walk the perimeter of the village, past mesh wire stores, filled to the top with bags of maize, locked up and reserved for the militias. Someone brings me a string-bed. Next morning, at 6 am, I crank up the radio. Daniel, our pilot, is on his way with the Twinotter. We unload the first ton of UNIMIX. 

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New York was freezing in January 1989. The meeting room on the 13th floor of UNICEF house has a wall of glass, but you can’t see Sudan from here. My hand-drawn map goes up on the screen. I confirm that we can start vaccinating children, anytime from tomorrow, in all places shown on the map; NGOs are on standby. Jim Grant says: We are going public with this.

I take the evening flight back to Nairobi. Soon, a telex from New York. The entire newly created Emergency Revolving Fund, a staggering one Million Dollar, has been put at my disposal, for the southern operation.

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Jim Grant waving off the first truck convoy leaving the UN HQ in Nairobi. The convoy barely makes it out of the gates; out of fear to never see them again, the contractors had only released their oldest trucks. It takes almost a week for the first trucks to arrive at Lokichogio. The publicity stunt was important, to send out to the world that the UN was crossing a border to assist children in areas controlled by a rebellious army. Nobody should dismiss it as a clandestine operation that would end and be forgotten as soon as it started. 

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In Kapoeta

Rattattattata. Again: rattattattata. The convoy comes to a sudden stop. Our Landcruiser is sandwiched between two SPLA trucks. Audrey Hepburn, on the passenger seat, looks at me. When the machine gun fires for the third time, I can see, from the corner of my eye, the head of a guinea fowl flying off its trunk. 

I had been preparing Audrey Hepburn’s visit – the first official flight of OLS across the border from Kenya into Southern Sudan. For a full day ahead of her visit, I met with the area commander, plotted a route that Audrey could take, seeing a bombed out clinic, broken water-pumps, hungry women and sick children. I sought assurances that nobody would shoot down the aircraft, and stuck my fingers in the mud to check the softness of the airfield.

Audrey remains composed, looks as fresh as when she stepped off the Cessna. She knows exactly what is expected, readily follows the photographers’ and journalists’ calls. She sits among the children, gracefully, looking serious but hopeful, unfazed by the SPLA hullabaloo.

The plane that should pick me up is cancelled. Bruce, a NGO colleague and I have to stay another night. As we are smoking our last cigarettes, a recruit in ragtag uniform and flip-flops deposits a headless guinea fowl next to our hut. 

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Wherever OLS was able to go, health centres, feeding centres and immunization campaigns were set up. Most children in southern Sudan had never been touched by any health services. 

Akobo (click on any picture to zoom in)

Through an arrangement with the Kenyan Expanded Programme of Immunization (facilitated by Baquer Namazi, who was UNICEF representative in Kenya), we were able to borrow any amount of vaccines from the Kenyan cold stores. Occasionally, we replenished what we took. Given the logistic challenges of building up a cold chain for temperature-sensitive vaccines in Sudan , and that local assistants were scarce, it worked surprisingly well – many of our partners were medical NGOs, and everyone understood the urgency.

Polio drops being administered in Bor

Lokichogio got fully equipped as a forwarding base. Our flight plans would ensure a steady supply of vaccines. Outreach was done, wherever a relief worker would go.

Murle children waiting to be immunized

Murle women and children waiting to be immunized

A Dinka lady carrying her twins, vaccination card in hand

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Life was tough for the relief workers in a war zone; there was no formal ceasefire. They came from all over the world; some stayed and lived in tents for years. During the first four years, OLS accessed and sustained on average 16 different stations, and sometimes up to 40 outposts. They were managed by either a UNICEF staff member, a WFP food monitor, or an associated NGO. Everything was common, not least the radio connection and the supply flights. Most relief workers would share meals and accommodation.

OLS Station in Torit

In larger outposts, trenches were dug for people  in case of a bombing attacks by the Khartoum Government. These did happen any time, no matter whether we had received clearances or not. I saw bombs being dropped onto the town of Bor. The trenches provided a measure of security, but could be filled with water and the occasional trapped snake. 

For the first years, OLS operated without professional security advice. The UN Department of Safety and Security did not exist, nor were there any training courses on security. OLS agencies adopted protocols to enhance the safety and security of its staff, including a daily roll-call to all stations. A code of conduct was to ensure that agencies were not only neutral, but also were seen as neutral by the SPLA. Most important was the networking of OLS agencies in a spirit of trust that allowed critical information to be shared rapidly through a single communication system. 

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Once an unknown village in the north-western-most corner of Kenya, Lokichogio turned into the logistic hub for everything that went into southern Sudan. The OLS camp was the most important transit stop for all relief workers, both from the UN and from NGOs. It was a place for those in need of rest and recuperation after having spent some weeks in Sudan. The camp  was entirely run by the UNICEF; it was not necessarily a safe or luxurious place. Hot showers were available from an overhead bucket; there was the occasional buffalo storming through the camp; poisonous snakes were crawling about; more difficult to handle were the stray bullets when the Toposa youth decided to rustle cattle of the Turkana. 

Lokichogio accommodation

Adrian Pintos with a Black Mamba found in one of the tents

Inside a rubb-hall storage tent

Myself  transiting through Lokichogio

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The idea was to travel as far as possible overland, to avoid costly air transport. All heavy goods would go by road as long as conditions allowed. Security and road conditions remained a permanent threat. Light goods and personnel were advised to go by air, if possible. 

Just across the border, between Narus and Kapoeta. All road transport from Lokichogio in Kenya has to pass through Toposa territory.

Toposa warriors continued to raid cattle from the Turkana, who lived in north-west Kenya and also Lokichogio.

The Toposa are of the independent type, and not particularly friendly towards the SPLA. They switched allegiances several times during the war.

River crossing near Torit

Sometimes, it simply would not go any further

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Lokichogio quickly became one of the busiest airstrips in East Africa. By mid 1993, OLS had simultaneously chartered 18 aircraft, connecting up to 40 locations in southern Sudan, and often flying several sorties a day. The fleet included tiny planes normally used for rescue landings on glaciers in the Swiss mountains, and several Hercules ex-military aircraft with a payload of 20 metric tons. Not all airplanes could land everywhere - the smaller planes were used to shuttle people or light-weight supplies such as vaccines and medicines, the larger ones usually carried food supplies for WFP. 

In the beginning, Lokichogio only had a minor airfield. It got successively graded, extended, tarmaced and - after many years - received a tower. 

A Hercules C-130 aircraft loaned to OLS by the Canadian airforce. I did not like it, as the additional fuel tanks under the wings looked like bombs ready to be dropped.

Inside the cockpit of a C-130. It takes a crew of five to fly a Hercules.

Reconnaissance flights often went into new locations without any ground contact, without knowing whether one would be welcome or not. It was wise to sit on bullet proof cushions. There would be nobody to chase animals from whatever had been left over from an airstrip after years of abandon. It happened that an aircraft returned to Lokichogio with bullet holes in its tail, though no aircraft was shot down, as had tragically happened over Aweil with an aircraft starting from Khartoum

Accompanying 6 tons of food in a Buffalo aircraft.

This DC3 served us well. At the time, it was 50 years old.

A Cessna 207 - a smaller, but not the smallest of  our aircraft

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Southern Sudan had remained one of the last great reservoirs of the highly contagious Rinderpest, spreading the disease from the Nile into the neighbouring countries. Vaccinating cattle against Rinderpest was a no-brainer. Cattle are the livelihood of the people of southern Sudan. They are the people's wealth and pride. Everyone wants his cattle to be vaccinated. Young children live in cattle camps, because of the abundance of milk. Rinderpest vaccination became our Trojan Horse for child immunization. 

Dinka cattle camp

Dinka dairy - with a well nourished child

In less than 3 years, Adrian Pintos and his Sudanese crew vaccinated 4 million cattle. It would have to take peace, until Sudan would be declared free of Rinderpest in 2008; and forever eradicated from the face of the earth in 2010.

And if you behaved well, you would be invited to a meal of blood and milk

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Years of war and neglect had rendered most water-systems broken. There was a wide range of water systems and pumps previously installed by different aid agencies. There were different types of handpumps and motor-driven deep wells. After a while, most of our outposts and outlying villages had a reliable water supply that was fixed by OLS. 

A shiny new diesel engine driving a deep well pump in Akobo

Willy Knocker overseeing repair of an Afridev handpump

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Provision of seeds and agricultural tools became a major part of the programme. One kilogram of sorghum seeds delivered and planted, would produce 30 to 60 kilograms of food that would not needed to be supplied later. An FAO expert helped to determine the type and needed quantities of seeds.

The SRRA agriculture coordinator showing off maize grown from OLS seeds

Love in the midst of war

It was not all that easy. There were pests, such as the locust seen here, but worse were the droughts. Forecasting, early alerts, and good planning was key to avert major stress and starvation

We were using sophisticated remote sensing data obtained from satellite imaging provided by the US embassy, to predict plant growth and success and failures of harvests. The colorful picture above shows the NDVI, or normalized difference vegetation index, which is a rough indicator of the biomass measured from a satellite.  Several months ahead of harvesting, a drought can be anticipated stretching across Sudan from Malakal to Kapoeta. 

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Fishing twine is not cheap. In southern Sudan, it wouldn't take long to see twine turned into nets and put to use. Many of us became experts in appraising the thickness of fishing twine and the size and shapes of hooks. 

It doesn't take long to make those nets, from fishing twine

Many of the traditional canoes, made from trees in the Ethiopian highlands, were gone: stolen by the militia or the army, or sunk. UNICEF had canoes manufactured from fiberglass for villages, which also helped people to cross rivers on their trek to safety.

UNICEF canoes and a RIB (rigid inflatable boat) on the Sobat river

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The children of southern Sudan had seen nothing else seen but war, violence, destruction and chaos. Education was a dream. They come to class, whether the classroom had a roof or not, or whether there was a classroom after all. They would sit under trees, or in the wide open space, without shade. They might have had no clothes, but they wanted to learn. 

Class near Bor

Near Nimule

The programme was started by Emma McCune from Street Kids International. She later left OLS, and married a warlord.

Today's lesson, in Pibor Post (on the blackboard): Be kind to animals

For our second order of education supplies from Copenhagen, I asked to pre-pack the materials so everything for 30 students is in one box. Exercise books, pencils, blackboard paint, chalk, basic science equipment. School in the box. 

Visitors from the UNICEF UK Natcom entertaining students with muppets, in Akobo

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Nasir was a major hub for relief operations into Upper Nile Region. Everything happened along the river, and OLS employed a fleet of motorized boats, RIBs, and canoes. Several NGOs were present, as were many WFP monitors.

OLS occupied the only remaining building in town, a riverfront property. It served as office, as kitchen, as mess and recreational room. Relief workers preferred to sleep in their so called mosquito domes - tents made from mosquito netting.

The airfield was good enough for only a small aircraft, such as our TwinOtter, during the dry season. When the rains started, the team reinforced the landing strip with bricks and rubble from the dilapidated buildings of Nasir. It was not quite what you might expect, but it worked well for our small planes.

Not your average airport - landing and take off on rubble

Checking out conditions

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The boys called "minors" were army recruits with or against their will. In May 1991, following the cessation of Ethiopian support to the SPLA, the Sudanese refugee camps in Ethiopia were dissolved. The minors arrived in Nasir ahead of the major trek of Sudanese returnees. They were accompanied by Ethiopian social workers employed by Rädda Barnen. UNHCR sent a lawyer; OLS – and UNICEF – got introduced to the idea of a ‘protection programme’. Tracing of the minor’s origin and the reunification with their families was done together with the ICRC. In 1991, the first boys were flown in our trusted DC3 – packed to full capacity - from Akobo to Leer.  

A group of minors in Nasir

Many minors that could not be reunited were later transferred to transition camps in Kenya, where they were discovered by and received much attention from the media, donors and visiting UN luminaries. (Remember, clicking on an image will enlarge it)

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Soon after, tens of thousands of returning Sudanese came down the Sobat River and poured into Nasir. 

The first wave of returnees arrives at Nasir

Many families returning from the camps in Ethiopia had built up good nutrition.

An Uduk mother and her child

Somehow their trek stopped. The crowding was unbelievable. 

People slept in grass-huts, exposed to the weather day and night. 

The SPLA, having lost their re-supply base in Ethiopia, played tricks with the refugee's presence. They prevented them from moving on and kept them hostage to press the release of government barge sitting in Malakal, loaded with thousands of tons of food and only a short distance away. 

Food had to be dropped from the air, as there was no landing space suitable for large aircraft in Nasir. An airdrop is dangerous for the crew and aircraft, when the load rolls out of the plane and shifts the balance. It is dangerous for those on the ground, because the food scatters around a vast area. Food gets dropped into the swamps, the river, or – as it sometimes appeared to be the case - just disappeared forever into the ground on impact. Recovery rates of 90% were considered to be very good.

The Hercules C-130 approaches. It carries 20 metric tons of grain.

The pallets with bags of food roll out of the tailgate

The bags of food scatter before they hit the ground with deafening sounds. Each sack has to be triple-packed. 

This is food. The bags have been collected from the drop zone. 

The Nasir base turned into a sorry affair. For weeks the relief workers, most of them in their late twenties, worked heroically from dawn to dusk, without much of a break. It had been raining, the air was steamy and the grounds were soft and the mud ankle-deep. Every day there were one or more airdrops, and picking up the scattered bags out of the swamp and distributing them along the Sobat was a herculean task. 

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A few weeks later, things spun out of control. Mass starvation struck on a giant scale, first in what became known as the hunger-triangle, the area between Waat, Ayod and Kongor. People appeared out of the nowhere, emaciated and without food for several weeks. Nobody knew where they had been. They simply had been off the radar of the humanitarian community, hidden and kept hostage by the SPLA.  They were the pawns in a cruel and inhuman war, where the perpetrators had lost their mind.

In the Hunger Trinagle - Kongor, Ayod, Waat

Feeding centers with supplementary and therapeutic food for children were run by the UN and NGOs, but children died who came too late.

Looking for single grains that had spilled from the bags of maize, under the wing of a relief plane

Canadian donors stood in silence, as children pick grains on the empty airfield of Waat

Then, the hunger spread southwards. The war continued in full scale, now with inter-factional fighting, between ruthless war lords inflicting raids, terror and fear among the population. Who could tell whether what was distributed as "dry ration" during the day was not taken away from the women at night.

Feeding Center near Torit

In the turmoil, four relief workers were murdered, when their vehicle run into an ambush laid for a renegade SPLA officer and his men. Two did not survive the ambush, two were executed several days later. They were like the microcosm of OLS: A UNICEF professional from Burma, a UNICEF General Service staff from Kenya, a Philippine NGO nurse, and a Norwegian journalist.

South Sudan became a country of its own in 2011. Factional fighting and insecurity continues. The Abyei area is still considered to be part of both South Sudan and Sudan on an interim basis, with UN peacekeepers in place.

Much has been written about the success or failure of OLS, and the failure of the UN as a whole to save hundreds of thousand people from starvation. I saw the government preventing the release of food that was ready to go. Likewise, I have seen the SPLA holding their own people hostage until they starved to death. The responsibility for mass starvation lies with those whose priority is political or military gain.

Above all, OLS was an effort to create hope and a contribution to peace, even if only for a moment in time.

See also: Band of Brothers and Sisters

Twelve of the above photographs were taken by my friend Adrian Pintos, whose address I  no longer have.

Detlef Palm was Programme Coordinator for Operation Lifeline from its inception in 1989 until June 1993.

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Other photo-stories by Detlef:

• The Somalia Experience
• Lunae Montes - a journey to the source of the Nile, in 1980
• A Walk on the Wild Side (New York)
• The Door to Hell and the Path to Health (Turkmenistan)
• Rudaki, a Wedding and Proto-Urban Sarazm (Tajikistan)
• Top of Mexico
• Magic South (Southern Africa)
• Azhdahak (from Germany to Armenia, by road)
• Into the Midnight Sun (Journey to the North Cape)
• At the edge of the bog - where we live

Detlef can be contacted via detlefpalm55@gmail.com