Khartoum has now declared a state of emergency on its southern border with the newly independent South Sudan, as tensions remorseless transform into a state of all-out war. Sudan has now imposed a trade embargo on the South and suspended the constitution, according to the SUNU news agency.
Sudan's President now has the right to establish special courts, in consultation with the chief justice. A state of emergency has been in effect for almost a decade in Darfur, along the western border with South Sudan. A similar status was in place in Blue Nile state last September when an ethnic insurgency began. Trade across the border has been effectively banned since South Sudan's independence but the emergency formalises the prohibition.
SUNU also reported that the governor of the state of White Nile in the border region has set a one-week deadline for 12,000 ethnic South Sudanese gathered south of Khartoum to leave the country. This comes on the back of Sudan's detention of four foreigners they suspect of aiding South Sudan.
Fighting continues in the region, mainly centred in the Heglig region where most of the region's oil is located. The South Sudanese have informed the UN that they are prepared to withdraw police forces from the disputed region of Abyei.
12,000 South Sudanese have been gathering in the border town of Kosti in recent weeks after the Sudanese government told South Sudanese living in the country to either regularise their residency papers or leave the country. Approximately 350,000 South Sudanese are in Sudan. Most moved there looking for work.
Many are now leaving but some have become stuck at the river port of Kosti as Khartoum refuses to allow barges to come up from South Sudan to take them. So while they have been given a deadline of 5th May to leave, the South Sudanese currently cannot leave Sudan because Sudan fears that the barges will be used to carry military equipment or militia.
Since the independence of the South, tensions have existed over the control of oil supplies. 75% of Sudanese oil is located in the South, with most of it in the disputed Heglig border region. However the oil must transit through Sudan. The oil is claimed by both sides.
Both countries are immensely poor and corrupt. Thousands of civilians stranded in the Nuba Mountains of Southern Kordofan, a Sudanese province with a population of 1.1 million, now face starvation. This is largely a result of the Sudanese government's restrictions on international humanitarian relief agencies from accessing troubled areas.
The recent fighting has destroyed large tracks of farmland and crops essential for isolated populations in Sudan's Blue Nile State and Southern Kordofan. 250,000 people in the region are threatened by starvation while a further 140,000 have been displaced. There are the aforementioned disputes over nationality with many South Sudanese stripped of jobs and citizenship in Sudan.
David Elkins of Al-Jazeera quoted Dr Eric Reeves, an expert on Sudan to Al-Jazeera saying that , €A vast humanitarian catastrophe is already underway, and there is no clear plan for either securing humanitarian corridors to these distressed populations in northern Sudan or for an appropriate pre-positioning of the food and non-food items that are critical
According to Peter Greste of Al-Jazeera, South Sudan is now facing a massive refugee crisis with growing numbers fleeing across the border from the North. Refugee camps in remote areas are in desperate need of humanitarian aid.
Disparities exist between the two countries. In parts of Sudan over 30% of schoolchildren complete primary education and in most parts of the country at least 11 to over 30% do. By contrast, in most of South Sudan less than 5% of children complete primary education.
While for most of Sudan, only 10-20% of households have €poor' food consumption, that figure is around 30-40% for most in the South. While in most of Sudan there are 60-70 deaths per 1,000 live births of children under 1, for most of South Sudan the figure is 71 to over 111 deaths per 1,000.