Conflict Sensitivity Analysis: United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) Protection of Civilian (PoC) Sites Transition: Bentiu, Unity State, and Malakal, Upper Nile State

This Conflict Sensitivity Analysis was requested by the Inter-Cluster Coordination Group (ICCG) in October 2020. It examines the key conflict dynamics and conflict sensitivity considerations of the transition of UN Protection of Civilian (PoC) sites under the protection of United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) in Bentiu, Unity State, and Malakal, Upper Nile State, to camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs) under the jurisdiction of the Government of the Republic of South Sudan (GRSS). This follows the announcement on 4 September 2020 of the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General (SRSG) in South Sudan, David Shearer, that UNMISS will ‘progressively withdraw its uniformed troops and police from the Bor and Wau PoCs and gradually do the same in the Juba, Bentiu and Malakal PoC sites’. The analysis used a mixed methods approach, including virtual semistructured interviews with key informants (KI) from multiple organisations (including UN agencies,
Cluster leads, national NGOs and international NGOs) and incorporating feedback from 10 focus group discussions (FGDs) conducted across different gender and age groups in Bentiu and Malakal PoCs which were facilitated by the Danish Refugee Council (DRC) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

This report looks at conflict sensitivity considerations of the PoC transition in Benitu and Malakal, and then provides recommendations to donors, aid agencies, UNMISS and the Government of South Sudan to consider during and after the transition. It identifies how aid actors’ response could mitigate negative impacts on conflict dynamics or leverage positive opportunities. The focus of this analysis is the PoC sites in Bentiu and Malakal, both of which have a history of inter-communal and inter-ethnic tension among neighbouring communities. The conflict sensitivity analysis does not provide an in-depth analysis of either the wider conflict dynamics in Unity and Upper Nile state or the broader housing, land and property (HLP) issues outside of the PoCs.