A Long Walk to Water

The conflict described in the novel is the Second Sudanese Civil War. This conflict began in 1983 and ended with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 2005, making it one of the longest civil wars in modern history, though it was in many ways a continuation of the First Sudanese Civil War, which ran from 1955 to 1973. Like other internal conflicts in Sudan, the Second Sudanese Civil War was largely a conflict between the central government—based in the North—and the peoples of the South. Sharp cultural and political divisions exist between Northern and Southern Sudan, and tensions between these regions date back to British colonial rule. These tensions were exacerbated in the postcolonial era as the Arabic-speaking, Muslim government of the North has sought to impose its culture on the tribal peoples of the South. A further source of conflict is the presence of oil fields along the North-South border. The First Sudanese Civil War ended with the Addis Ababa Agreement of 1973, which granted limited autonomy to Southern Sudan. The peace lasted 10 years until President Gaafar Nimeiry attempted to take control of the oil fields, ending Southern autonomy in the process. This act of aggression was motivated by a combination of economic and cultural factors—the Northern government wanted the economic power that would come with control of the oil fields; at the same time, Islamic fundamentalists in Nimeiry’s government resented the cultural autonomy of the non-Muslim peoples in the South and wished to impose Islamic law throughout the country.

The Second Sudanese Civil War ended in 2005, having led to around 2 million deaths in Sudan alone and devastated the Sudanese economy. Millions of people who were displaced from Southern Sudan fled to refugee camps elsewhere in Africa and, in some cases, migrated to the US and Europe. This is the story dramatized in A Long Walk to Water.

In April 2023, a third civil war began in Sudan as the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), under the leadership of Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, engaged in a power struggle with the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), led by de facto Sudanese ruler Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. As of June 2024, the conflict has precipitated a famine that US ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield has characterized as “the largest humanitarian crisis on the face of the planet ” (“Administrator Samantha Power and Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield at a Press Availability on Sudan.” United States Mission to the United Nations, 14 June 2024).