The number of civilians seeking shelter in U.N. bases in South Sudan has topped 100,000 for the first time in more than six-months of conflict, the United Nations said Thursday. The continuing rise in the number of people fleeing violence offers a clear indication that conditions are worsening in the impoverished country, with more than 101,000 people crammed inside squalid U.N. camps across the country. The biggest increase has been in the northern oil-town of Bentiu, the state capital of Unity, where more than 45,000 civilians are in an improvised camp in dire conditions, with many areas flooded due to heavy rain. "Many do not feel safe," Hilde Johnson, the top U.N. official in South Sudan, said Thursday after visiting Bentiu this week. "This is also reflecting a terrible consequence of the fighting, which is food insecurity," she said. "People are hungry, there is severe malnutrition, and civilians are also coming to the UNMISS base for food." The conflict in the world's newest and one of its poorest countries has killed thousands and forced more than 1.5 million to flee their homes since fighting erupted in mid-December.
