Machar objects Uganda's inclusion in South Sudan atrocities panel

By Samuel Ouga

The South Sudanese rebel group SPLM/A-IO has strongly objected to the inclusion of Uganda in a committee constituted on a report on The African Union Commission of Inquiry on South Sudan conflict.

The African Union established a seven member committee with representatives coming from Algeria, Chad, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda. The committee is to make recommendation and submit to the AU-PSC summit scheduled for the first week of August 2015.

Dr. Riek Machar, in the statement, said; “The SPLM/SPLA strongly objects to the inclusion of Uganda in this Committee. Uganda has been a party to the conflict since the beginning (15th December 2013).”  In the statement that New Vision has seen; SPLM/O accuses Uganda of committing crimes in support of the Juba regime and asked that Uganda’s role be investigated.

Dr. Riek Machar appealed to “the AU-PSC to expunge the republic of Uganda from the committee and substitute it with a neutral country.

Dr. Machar also protested that SPLM/SPLA was not invited to the AU-PSC meeting that took place on Friday; 24, 2015 where the report of the African Union Commission of inquiry on Spouth Sudan distributed and tabled.

The SPLM/O accused the African Union for not serving them with a copy of the report yet the same was “served to the Government of South Sudan a week before the AU-PSC Summit…”

Dr. Machar said SPLM/O expect to be officially served with a copy of the report and invited to the summit where the report will be discussed.

true

Background of the conflict

In 15 December 2013, at the meeting of the National Liberation Council meeting at Nyakuron, opposition leaders Dr. Riek Machar, Pagan Amum and Rebecca Nyandeng voted to boycott the Sunday December 15, 2013 meeting of the National Liberation Council (NLC).  President Salva Kiir ordered the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) Major General Marial Ciennoung, commander of the Presidential Guard (The Tiger Battalion) to leave the meeting venue and return to the barracks to disarm troops. After disarming all ethnicities within the guard, Marial allegedly ordered that the Dinka members be re-armed. 

His deputy, from the Nuer ethnicity reportedly questioned the order and a fight ensued when surrounding officers saw the commotion. The Nuer soldiers also re-armed themselves.  Fighting erupted between the Dinka elements of the Presidential Guard and the Nuer elements. 

President Salva Kiir has called it a coup attempt and announced that it had been put down the next day, but fighting again erupted on 16 December and spread beyond the capital, Juba. 

No official death toll has been kept. In November 2014, the International Crisis Group think-tank estimated that as many as 50,000 had died and the killing has continued unabated since, while hunger and disease have added even more to the toll.

More than two million people have been forced to flee during the war, leaving behind whatever meagre possessions they had to be looted or ransacked by armed forces.

Over 616,000 South Sudanese are refugees in neighbouring nations, with 480,000 of those having fled in the past year. Ethiopia hosts the majority, followed by Uganda, Sudan and Kenya.

A further 1.6 million are refugees in their own country, living in squalid displacement camps, in swamps and forests, or in villages considered safe only because they are deep inside their own ethnic fiefdoms. Over 150,000 people are sheltering inside UN bases.

WAR CRIMES?

The war has been characterised by ethnic massacres and rape. Recent attacks have included castration, rape and tying children together before slitting their throats. Others were thrown into burning houses.

In March 2015, a leaked draft version of the African Union Inquiry report stated that South Sudanese capital was 'ethnically cleansed' in December 2013. The leaked African Union document reported that a “killing spree” took place in Juba from 16-18 December that left alive few Nuer besides those who fled to UN compounds.

The AU Commission of Inquiry is yet to release the report to the public, months following its completion.