Good afternoon to all of you and sorry for making you wait; we are just out of the Presidential Palace.
I would like to share with you a few impressions.
First, why I came at this particular point to South Sudan. This was simply a reflection that the coming into operation of the Transitional Government of National Unity in South Sudan equates the opening of a new page in the situation of the country. So I wanted to evaluate the situation and listen to South Sudanese actors. This morning I had meetings with the Vice President, with the First Vice president and with the President himself.
I also wanted to see for myself the situation on the ground, and yesterday and the day before we went to Bentiu and then to Malakal to see the situation there and evaluate in particular of the Protection of Civilians sites and the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).
As I said, a new page is opening now for South Sudan with this government of transition that has announced a number of measures that are of course very important regarding what is going to happen now. As we all know there are very large number of priorities for the country, how to address the situation in terms of stability and security. That of course is a very high priority item.
Second, the situation of the IDPs and their return (inaudible). Third, the situation from the institutional point of view, including the issue of the states in the country and of course last, but not least, the very critical issue of the economy and of the humanitarian situation, with food insecurity being an immense problem.
On all of these issues, it was very important to listen to our South Sudanese interlocutors with one very important message, it is that the responsibilities are theirs, but that the UN are here to help.
We are not there to substitute, the decisions have to be made by the South Sudanese themselves, but we are in support. And the fact that the Security Council remains very focused on South Sudan after all these years in which we have invested - invested a very large amount of political capital but also resources, resources in terms of staff and sometimes unfortunately in terms of human lives.
We want all these to be put to the best use, and of course UNMISS under the leadership of SRSG