CRS History in Sudan

Catholic Relief Services has worked in Sudan since the end of the first major civil war in 1972 when the agency helped to resettle internally displaced Sudanese. Since that time, CRS has provided emergency relief in many parts of the country and has supported long-term development programs, particularly in southern and central Sudan.

In 1984, shortly after the start of the second civil war, CRS shifted our programming focus from Khartoum to southern Sudan. For security and logistical reasons, the main program office was relocated to Nairobi, Kenya.

Humanitarian interventions expanded in 1989 when CRS became a pioneer member of Operation Lifeline Sudan, a consortium of U.N. agencies and nongovernmental organizations founded to provide relief in the face of deteriorating conditions across southern and central Sudan. A support office in Lokichoggio, Kenya, near the Sudan border, enabled CRS and our partners to transport thousands of tons of food to Sudanese desperately in need.

In 2003, while the northern government and southern rebels engaged in peace talks, a separate but related conflict broke out in the western region of Darfur. To respond to the urgent humanitarian crisis in western Sudan, and to once again assist displaced people in the Khartoum area, CRS reopened an office in the country's capital in May 2004. CRS later opened a field office in El Geneina, the state capital of West Darfur.

The signing of a Comprehensive Peace Agreement in January 2005 formally ended the fighting between the government in Khartoum, the Sudan People's Liberation Army, and varying other rebel factions. The decades of violence left more than 2 million Sudanese dead and more than 4 million displaced from their homes. The agreement established the Government of National Unity as well as the semi-autonomous Government of Southern Sudan. The agreement also calls for a countrywide census, elections in 2009, and a referendum in 2011 on possible secession for southern states and Abyei.

Since the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, security has slowly improved in the south. Hundreds of thousands of refugees and internally displaced families are now returning to their ancestral lands. As a result, CRS opened an office in Juba in 2006 to better support our growing reconstruction and development programs, moving full operations for southern Sudan from Nairobi to Juba in early 2008. Staff provide additional support from field offices in Anyidi, Bor, Ikotos, Nimule, Torit and Yambio.