22 May, 2017
South Sudan pro-government forces killed 114 civilians a year ago in a town called Yei, amid growing ethnic violence in the country's civil war, a new United Nations report said Friday. The documented cases included [press release] attacks on funerals, indiscriminate shelling of civilians, and sexual violence towards women and girls with an excessive degree of brutality. The killing "executed through the directives of high ranking officers in Juba with the knowledge of Salva Kiir" was done to as a punishment "to anyone sympathetic to rebels or the community with known elements of rebels".in just a short 2 days of campaign, 114 people were killed, according to the report.
The U.N. says the crimes "may amount to war crimes or crimes against humanity" and warrant further investigation.
The investigation released by the United Nations human rights office said that those cases and other abuses in Yei between July and January may amount to crimes against humanity.
South Sudan army spokesperson Colonel Santo Domic Chol told Reuters news agency on Friday that the report was "baseless".
Domic said President Kiir had given orders to all SPLA commanders in Yei to punish soldiers who commit gender-based violence.
Yei had been "largely a peaceful town", the United Nations said, with 200,000 to 300,000 residents of different ethnicities.
Opposition forces also have been responsible for abuses in South Sudan's conflict, now in its fourth year. About 180,000 more were registered in Uganda by the first week of February 2017. As rebel leader Riek Machar fled into neighboring Congo, fighting broke out in Yei and elsewhere along his path.
Citing data from South Sudan's Relief and Rehabilitation Commission, the report said 46,000 Dinka civilians, mainly from Yei town, had been registered in Juba by the end of 2016. It added that Yei, a traditionally ethnically diverse area, had been largely peaceful before the attacks.
