More than 2,000 refugees from Sudan and South Sudan have arrived at Kakuma refugee camp in northwestern Kenya since January this year, a UN humanitarian agency said.The UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said the actual number of arrivals may be higher, as 686 new arrivals, many of them from Sudan and South Sudan, are currently at the reception centre. OCHA said the refugees are waiting for the registration with the (Kenyan) Department of Refugee Affairs (DRA), while others are unregistered and staying with relatives in the camp. “Kakuma refugee camp in north-western Kenya has recorded increased rates of new arrivals from Sudan and South Sudan during January and February,” OCHA said in its humanitarian update received on Monday. “From Feb. 1 to 21, 1,328 individuals (458 from Sudan, 870 from South Sudan) have been registered by UNHCR, bringing the total number of new arrivals registered from Sudan and South Sudan in 2012 to 1,823, or approximately 230 per week,” it said.South Sudan is facing a major food crisis and heavily-armed ethnically-based militias that have been sweeping parts of the countryside, killing hundreds and making a mockery of the South Sudanese security forces. The development comes as a senior UN relief chief has expressed deep concern at the deteriorating humanitarian conditions in Sudan’s states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile, where continued fighting is killing countless civilians and displacing hundreds of thousands of others.Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Valerie Amos said last week that action was urgently needed to assist the needs of people caught up in the conflict. Amos, who is also UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, called on the Sudanese Government and the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Movement – North (SPLM-N) to respond swiftly and positively to the joint proposal of the UN, the Arab League and the African Union for humanitarian workers to be granted immediate access to those in need in the two states.According to OCHA, the majority of newly-arrived asylum seekers fled from South Kordofan in Sudan and Jonglei State in South Sudan. “Given the ongoing violence in both regions, as well as the shrinking of protection space in South Sudan due to attacks in border areas and a rapidly worsening economic crisis, UNHCR expects the increased arrival rate from Sudan and South Sudan to continue,” it said.Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile, which lie on the border between Sudan and its newly-independent neighbour,
