Building Bridges In South Sudan: Part one

This week, after six months of detailed planning and reconnaissance with our United Nations partners, soldiers from the UK Taskforce in South Sudan boarded a helicopter and flew north to begin a vital task.

Op Trenton is ongoing in South Sudan in Africa

Major Matt Clarke, Officer Commanding the Malakal Engineering Group gives an insight into British forces’ work in the region:

For the next month we are working alongside an Indian Army team in the village of Kodok on the west bank of the White Nile, 50 kilometres from our main base. The work we are doing there will enable the UN to improve security and delivery of humanitarian assistance in a country where 50% of the population (almost 7 million people) are facing starvation.

The Task Force Commander, Lieutenant Colonel Jamie Stuart RE, visits the site with Indian troops to see the heavily damaged bridge before British soldiers begin their work.

After a great deal of preparation and training the Royal Engineers, Royal Anglian soldiers and medics, led by Lieutenant Rosemary Leyshon, Drum Major Stan Wildney and Corporal Simon Murphy have deployed to support the construction of a new UN base in the area. Protected throughout by the Drum Major and his men, Cpl Murphy’s team will be repairing a key bridge and improve the route before working with the UN to build the base.

Once complete the bridge will enable Indian troops to patrol a far larger area in their armoured vehicles and provide greater security for local villages. In addition it will allow humanitarian organisations and others to provide aid to a higher number of local people in an area currently classified as being on the verge of famine.

Kodok is the ancestral capital of the Shilluk tribe — the third largest ethnic group in the country — and an area which has seen a great deal of fighting since South Sudan gained independence in 2011. Last year’s peace agreement has enabled security to slowly improve, and the King of the Shilluk people has recently chosen to return to his homeland. Through our work in the village we hope to encourage more local people to leave the UN “Protection of Civilians sites” (refugee camps) and return to the homes which they’d been forced to abandon during the war.

Some members of the team prepare to board UN helicopters to Kodok.

After all of the work that has gone into planning this mission, we’re glad to be on the ground and finally getting to grips with the task.

We’ll be posting weekly updates from the soldiers in Kodok as they establish themselves and begin to make progress.