UPDATE: Just spoke with Mary on the phone. She is now in Pibor town and has not been arrested yet. She sounded very calm and a bit more relaxed than I expected. She was able to get word out to some outside sources that seemed to have been ablel to send messages to the local authority to back off. There still could be problems, but for the time being everything seems ok.
This was in my email this afternoon when I got home today. Stress levels have hit the roof.
“Dear Rob,
I just received a distressed called from Mary. She’s outside Gumaruk enroute to Pibor. She was not clear if it was SPLA, police or security services, but someone made an attempt to arrest her in Gumuruk. She says that they arresting her on the grounds that she reported SPLA mistreatment of Murle during disarmament to the BBC. I’m not sure about this as I was not involved in her meetings in Juba regarding the disarmament issue. Not sure what kind of steps she took with regards to disarmament.
She managed to avoid arrest in Gumaruk but she was warned that she will be arrested upon arrival into Pibor.
She claims to be “100 percent sure” that she will be arrested. ”
Will post more as I get information.
This was taken Wednesday morning before she left for her trip by Arne Doornebal a Correspondent for Dutch press agency GPD, in Uganda.
