A surge of fighting in eastern South Sudan has forced 60 aid workers to flee, the UN humanitarian agency said Saturday, hurting efforts to help civilians in the famine-hit nation. An increase in violence nationwide has seen thousands flee in the past two weeks, including more than 16,000 from the second-largest city of Wau — … Read more
Targeted killings of specific ethnic groups in South Sudan’s civil war amount to “genocide”, according to Britain’s International Development Minister Priti Patel. “It’s tribal, it’s absolutely tribal, so on that basis it’s genocide,” Patel told reporters in Uganda on Wednesday, according to a ministry press officer travelling with her. Patel was returning from a visit … Read more
In the no man’s land between South Sudan and Uganda wind lashes though scrubland, whipping hot dust into the eyes of David Otong Oroma and his sister as they struggle to push their heavily laden motorbike over the border. The pair fled from the South Sudanese town of Pajok, an ethnic Acholi agricultural and trading … Read more
In July 2016, violent clashes broke out in Juba, the capital of South Sudan. The clashes were between the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), controlled by the President, Salva Kiir on one side, and the Sudan People’s Liberation Army – In Opposition (SPLA-IO), controlled by the then First Vice President, Riek Machar on the other … Read more
South Sudanese rebel group Sudan People’s Liberation Movement In-Opposition (SPLM-IO) led by former Vice President Riek Machar has accused government forces of killing six aid workers on Saturday. Spokesperson for the military wing Paul Gabriel Lam told local media Sudan Tribune that the attack was unfortunate and an independent investigation should be launched into the … Read more
A South Sudan rebel spokesperson quoted by the Reuters news agency is blaming the government for the deaths of six aid workers at the weekend. They were travelling between Juba, the capital, and the town of Pibor. Spokesman for rebel SPLM-IO forces Lam Paul Gabriel told Reuters: “We don’t have forces in that area. Instead … Read more
A senior South Sudanese general has quit, accusing President Salva Kiir and top members from his majority Dinka tribe of “ethnic cleansing,” according to a resignation letter obtained by AFP Sunday. Lieutenant-General Thomas Cirillo Swaka is the country’s deputy chief of general staff for logistics and a respected figure among the country’s foreign partners. I … Read more
The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) on Wednesday said there are still over 16,000 South Sudanese children involved in active combat among the various armed groups in the war-torn country despite the release of about 2,000 children since 2013. UNICEF South Sudan spokesman Timothy Irwin told Xinhua in an interview in Juba that they estimate more … Read more
At least 11 people are dead and 16 others have been injured after an attack on football fans in South Sudan, local media report. A gunman opened fire on a crowd watching an English Premier League game near the town of Juba. South Sudan’s National Courier newspaper said the gunman had escaped despite a “prompt … Read more
This used to be South Sudan’s second largest city, a bustling center on the White Nile River of more than 120,000 people, many employed in the oil fields nearby. Today Malakal is rubble and almost entirely deserted by civilians, a city emptied by three years of civil war and now by new rounds of fighting. … Read more
The United Nations’ top human-rights official has accused South Sudanese government troops and rebels of ethnically targeted atrocities, including extrajudicial executions and rapes, during renewed fighting over the last month. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said on Thursday that preliminary findings showed that the majority of crimes were carried … Read more